Zerohedge reports that Nikolas Cruz, the 19-year-old orphan with a troubled past, a fascination with weapons and resistance groups, and an AR-15 rifle, was charged with 17 counts of premeditated murder Thursday morning after being questioned for hours by state and federal authorities following the deadliest school shooting in the U.S. in five years.
Fourteen wounded survivors were hospitalized as bodies were recovered from inside and around Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, the AP reports.
Nikolas Cruz, still wearing a hospital gown after being treated for labored breathing, and weighing in at 5-foot-7 and 131 pounds, was ordered held without bond and booked into jail.
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While authorities offered no immediate details about Cruz or his possible motive, they said that he had been kicked out of the high school, which has about 3,000 students. Students who knew him described a volatile teenager whose strange behavior had caused others to end friendships with him.
Cruz’s mother Lynda Cruz died of pneumonia on Nov. 1 neighbors, friends and family members said, according to the Sun Sentinel. Cruz and her husband, who died of a heart attack several years ago, adopted Nikolas and his biological brother, Zachary, after the couple moved from Long Island in New York to Broward County.
The boys were left in the care of a family friend after their mother died, family member Barbara Kumbatovich, of Long Island, said.
Unhappy there, Nikolas Cruz asked to move in with a friend’s family in northwest Broward. The family agreed and Cruz moved in around Thanksgiving.
According to the family’s lawyer, who did not identify them, they knew that Cruz owned the AR-15 but made him keep it locked up in a cabinet. He did have the key, however. According to the Daily News, Cruz legally bought the AR-15 he used to wage war on innocents at his former school, according to an attorney for the family with which he lived.
“It was his gun,” family lawyer Jim Lewis said. “The family made him keep it in a locked gun cabinet in the house but he had a key.” Lewis added that the family is devastated and didn’t see this coming. They are cooperating with authorities, he said.
Joel Leffler, a father of one of the Douglas High School students took to Facebook to discuss what happened:
Suspect in custody. Nicholas Cruz. Per Broward County PD scanner #Breaking #SchoolShooting #Parkland #StonemanDouglas #Shootinf pic.twitter.com/wc2e8Z6etu
— spence (@smarcus27) February 14, 2018
Nicholas Cruz’s Instagram profile is disturbing. WARNING, GRAPHIC IMAGES FOLLOW (via The Gateway Pundit)…
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