Parkland Parent's Biggest Wish Is For Nikolas Cruz To Be Murdered In Jail

Nikolas Cruz, who murdered 17 people at a Parkland, Florida high school in a mass shooting in 2018, will spend the rest of his life in prison as the jury rejected the death penalty. The shooting is the deadliest school shooting in Florida history.

The jury’s decision stunned the relatives of the victims, including 14 students and three educators who were murdered during the February 14, 2018, mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High.

On Tuesday, parents of the Parkland school massacre victims stood in front of the courtroom and spoke their final words to Nikolas Cruz ahead of him officially being sentenced to life in prison.

Michael Schulman was the parent of Scott Beigel, a teacher at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High who was murdered during the 2018 mass shooting. On Tuesday in the courtroom, Schulman said a prayer for his son, and then went on to say his biggest wish is for Nikolas Cruz to be murdered in jail.

During his victim impact statement, he mentioned he has a birthday coming up, and his one birthday wish is to get a call informing him Cruz is dead.

“My hope, my prayer, is that for my birthday present I get word you are dead,” he said while pointing his finger directly at Cruz. “That the prisoners and the inmates you associate with execute the judgment that this court can’t.”

“I hope that it’s the most painful judgment ever,” he continued. “I hope that when your final death comes, you will have the same fear, the same agony as the 16 people you killed and my son. Hope that your death is slow and agonizing.”

Schulman went on to warn Cruz of how brutal prison violence can be. “Because it won’t be like a state execution. Prison justice is a bitch. When your fellow inmates execute the death penalty that you deserve, they will do so in such a cold, calculating, heinous manner that you’ll be wishing the state of Florida had executed you in the compassionate way they must execute by law,” he said.

Beigel was a geography teacher who was murdered after opening his classroom door to try and provide shelter to students.

On Thursday, October 13, the judge read the jury’s decision inside the courtroom, which stated that Cruz’s troubled life was enough to spare him the death penalty by the state of Florida. The verdict came after many witnesses took the stand, explaining Cruz’s behavior leading up to, and during the shooting.

According to one doctor’s testimony, Nikolas Cruz “used several motor tasks when he killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School but he scored extremely low on certain tests.” The expert had trouble explaining this while on the stand all day Tuesday as it didn’t fit together.

“They don’t fit together for me,” clinical neuropsychologist Dr. Robert Denney said. “The real-world functioning doesn’t match the test result.”

The doctor testified that it was hard to believe Cruz did so poorly on the Finger Tapping Test when he was able to move around, pull the trigger and reload the gun so quickly.

“That’s the kind of score I would expect, potentially from a stroke patient,” Denney said while on the stand. “I would also expect that low score in somebody who has a substantial or severe traumatic brain injury.”

The former MSD student pleaded guilty to 17 counts of first-degree murder and 17 counts of attempted murder last year.