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© Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.Families unleash grief and anger on Parkland school shooter
By TERRY SPENCER FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla©2025 GPlusMedia Inc.
47 Comments
TokyoLiving
That coward should be executed..
plasticmonkey
There’s really something sickening about this. I understand these people’s emotions, but wishing someone a painful death is just morally wrong. Vengeance and justice are not the same thing.
bass4funk
I couldn’t agree more, he should die a horrible and miserable death.
bass4funk
The needle is fine, firing squads, hanging, I’m good with that as well.
Always laser focused, Plastic.
ExtraPat
I wonder if anyone put half the blame on courts and politicians for their cowardice in not standing up to the NRA and stopping the gun epidemic.
Bob Fosse
“Jurors said those voting for life believed Cruz is mentally ill and should be spared. Under Florida law, a death sentence requires unanimity.”
Usually your argument against gun control is mental illness. This jury, in Florida won’t permit the death penalty, because of the issue of mental illness. Under Florida law.
bass4funk
Yes.
Yes, that is the law, accepted, but definitely disagree with the ruling, but respect the courts decision.
plasticmonkey
Clearly not. You first called for a "horrible and miserable death", and then said they should stick to legal forms of execution, which under the constitution are not considered horrible and miserable. So which is it?
Bob Fosse
Even Florida agree. Calling for horrible and miserable execution of the mentally ill is wrong.
Bob Fosse
No “thank god for appeals” in this case?
If California hadn’t pursued the death penalty would you have accepted the courts decision?
Yrral
The jury made their decision,and it should be respected, nobody that are willing to sit on jury panel , should not complain
Yrral
Japanese do not have a jury system made up of citizens, because the government do not trust Japanese to make an objective decision,these were ordinary citizen made to look at thing ,that a normal person saw,
bass4funk
Wrong!
As I have stated earlier, and for the record, I think the way I think and that’s how I feel about capital punishment and nothing or anyone will change the way I feel. You asked me a question and I responded, now the law is the law and I accept it, but I support the death penalty unabashedly and unapologetically.
bass4funk
Tell the parents that. Anyone with a child can fully understand how they feel.
wallace
Cruz fired 140 shots with an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle.
Until the US introduces sensible gun laws restricting these types of weapons there will be more mass murders again.
Yrral
Bass4,the jury is not there to please the parents,they are charges against the dignity of the state
bass4funk
I understand, but I have kids and as a father I completely understand how they feel, they are absolutely in being outraged, they will never see their kids and loved ones again, and Cruz gets to lives, but it’s prison, and we all know how these things can change once the general population finds out what you did, so many people like him found out in the end, that’s just a harsh fact.
stormcrow
The heads of the NRA and the GOP should have been there as well.
Rodney
He should be in a mental institution. NRA should be on trial too. The families shouldn’t stoop to such low levels. Accept closure, don’t ferment hate. The guys life will be self suffering.
plasticmonkey
You gave two contradictory answers.
painkiller
“If this, the worst mass shooting to go to trial, does not deserve the death penalty, what does?" she said.
Death penalty well-deserved here.
Express sister
This person is awful. But I am opposed to the state having the power of life and death over anyone. Life in prison, IMO.
Paustovsky
This reads like a courtroom scene from the 1850's. Sadly the families fire and brimstone impotence won't stop another shooting this week or next week.
bass4funk
No, you just don’t like the answer I gave you.
Agreed!
Bob Fosse
I fully support victim impact statements.
I don’t support the death penalty or vigilantism at all. In this incidence neither does Floridian law.
wallace
Revenge never brings closure.
By the end of last year, 108 countries had abolished the death penalty for all crimes, eight countries had abolished the death penalty for crimes not committed during times of war and 28 countries still retained the death penalty but had not executed anyone over the past 10 years.
Fifty-five countries still retain and implement the death penalty.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/10/infographic-which-countries-still-have-the-death-penalty-2
Capital punishment has been abolished in 23 states and in the federal capital, Washington, D.C. Capital punishment is, in practice, only applied for aggravated murder.
In Florida, during the Desantis term, only two people were executed. The last one was in 2019.
bass4funk
Depends on the person. It absolutely depends.
Ok…and?
Good
What this act pretty much calls for.
Bob Fosse
‘Pretty much’?
Surely deciding someone’s sentencing to the death penalty would require a little more clarity and certainty.
Do you think he’s mentally ill?
Yes, and you are advocating executing the mentally ill.
No, and you are admitting maybe mental illness isn’t the only factor behind mass shootings.
wallace
bass4funk
Not according to the hundreds of studies and reports. Interviewing the families and friends of the victims. The prison wardens who carry out the executions.
"Proponents of capital punishment have long argued for the death penalty as necessary to “do justice” for and bring closure to family members of homicide victims. But science suggests that achieving closure through execution may be a myth and growing numbers of family members of homicide victims oppose capital punishment or do not want it pursued in the deaths of their loved ones."
https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/new-voices/victims-families
The Closure Myth
How the death penalty fails victims’ families
https://ejusa.org/resource/the-closure-myth/
There are many more.
The last person executed in the District of Columbia was in 1957.
wallace
Want to stop the killings change the gun laws.
bass4funk
Yes
I would think shooting up and killing a bunch of innocent kids would be clarity enough, he certainly did it a clear “certainty.”
Any person that kills innocent people in that fashion is mentally compromised, as to what degree I wouldn’t know.
In this case, this individual cannot be rehabilitated, like I said, he’s going to prison, and so we shall see what happens next
No, I do think mental illness is the primary factor, but it doesn’t matter at this point, what he did is what he did, he killed those people, and he should not be around society ever again. As a parent, I would feel the same, so I’m not blaming these parents and they’re outraged, not one bit.
bass4funk
That wouldn’t change anything, people still die, whether it’s one, two, or 25
wallace
bass4funk
So it does not matter to you whether it is 1, 2, or 25.
bass4funk
I was very clear, I never said how I felt, that’s irrelevant.
plasticmonkey
There is an animal called a weasel. It's reputation among the public is not widely respected.
Yes. That's what prisons are for. The death penalty is just cathartic justice. It gets some people off. They get to feel like God for a bit.
painkiller
wallaceToday 12:12 pm JST
There are already gun laws in place that make it illegal to kill people with guns.
JTC
Were one of my Kids killed by this person, I would feel the same and wish something unethical/inhumane upon them. Perhaps that is what it may take ? A completely inhumane, public example, of a slow and very painful death, something that the Government approves as Publicly viewable by all. Showing the administration of a very slow, yet potent chemical to an individual who has committed (without doubt) such Crimes, showing in graphic detail, what the State will do to you should you do the same to others, and also just in case you think your Family or Relations or Friends will benefit, showing what happens to them too... should they be proven that they too, are culpable, and only this, action, as inhumane, and terrifying, as it may appear, be our only way out of this terrible situation in the U.S.
Blacklabel
Enforce the gun laws we already have. Starting in Chicago.
ClippetyClop
How's that going then?
Avoid the problems that you already have. Starting in every major city.
ClippetyClop
It isn't going well I'm afraid to tell you. Lots of people getting shot. Your car life is irrelevant.
After they shoot lots of people. Genius.
JTC
And, if it were my own Kid involved in such an event, I would accept the need to personally put that Kid down, even if I have the pull the trigger myself. That in itself, would be so painful, but I inadvertidly, caused the pain to others in the first place by raising such a person.
I would also at the same time, challenge the Government as to why they were unable to provide Mental/Medical assistance, and ask for those responsible to likewise be "put down" (shot) as they too share some of the blame. Here in Japan, this is actually... the real problem we should be looking at, rather than trying to sweep matters under the proverbial carpet.
wallace
How many mass shootings this year?
There Have Been Over 580 Mass Shootings in the US in 2022 So Far
Mass shootings are defined as events where at least four people are shot, either injured or killed, not including the shooter, according to the Gun Violence Archive.
https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/national-international/graphics-details-on-the-hundreds-of-mass-shootings-in-the-us-in-2022/3326699/
They are increasing.
Bob Fosse
What do you call someone who wants to execute criminals?
Or lock up people before they commit a crime?
Is that what ‘normal people’ would want?
Blacklabel
We know who is shooting who. We know who has the illegal guns and who are the criminals and where mass shootings happen weekly.
but liberals wont “go there” it’s easier to go after the legal owners.
Bob Fosse
Cruz was a legal owner. The Florida police did nothing despite knowing plenty about him. Are they ‘liberals’?
Blacklabel
He owned a legal gun not an illegal one, he had no criminal record. He wasn’t released without bail after a previous shooting. He didn’t live where there are mass shootings evey week.
Bob Fosse
Mass shootings are overwhelmingly mostly committed by white males, with legal weapons, with no or little criminal history.
Allusions to black crime are not relevant to this news story or most other news stories about mass shootings and reflect poorly on those who make them.