Brother of Nikolas Cruz arrested
MIAMI: The brother of Nikolas Cruz, who is accused of killing 17 people last month at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, was arrested on a trespassing charge at the school on Monday afternoon, the authorities said.
Deputies with the Broward County Sheriff’s Office stopped the brother, Zachary Cruz, at about 4.30pm after he rode a skateboard on to school property. Mr Cruz, 18, told the deputies that he decided to visit the school to “reflect on the school shooting and to soak it in”, according to the sheriff ’s office.
Mr Cruz was arrested on one count of trespassing on the grounds or facility of a school, a misdemeanour. The sheriff’s office said that school officials had ordered Mr Cruz to stay away from Stoneman Douglas High. It was not immediately clear when Mr Cruz had received those warnings.
On Monday night, Mr Cruz was being held with bail set at US$25 in the same Broward County jail where his brother, who faces 17 counts of pr em editated murder, is being held without bond.
Broward County Public Schools did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday night. It was not clear whether Mr Cruz had a lawyer yet.
Zachary Cruz, who, like his brother, was adopted, had a strained relationship with him. Cruz has lived with a guardian since his mother’s death in November 2017. Two days after the school shooting, he told deputies from the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office that he regretted that he and his friends had bullied his older brother.
“Zachary wishes that he had been ‘nicer’ to his brother,” the deputies’ report said, adding that Nikolas “may have been the favoured brother”.
He also told the authorities that he felt as if “someone was trying to get me” and that he was upset about media coverage of the shooting.
He said he was “scared as he thought he had heard people outside,” the sheriff’s report said.