Hearing focuses on FBI missteps
Senate panel delves into Fla. massacre, gun control moves
WASHINGTON— As students walked out of schools across the country Wednesday to protest gun violence, a Senate hearing examined law enforcement agencies’ failure to heed multiple warnings about the Parkland, Fla., manaccused of killing 17 people at a high school, as well as the long record of failed gun control measures in Congress.
The Senate Judiciary Committee hearing took place as the accused gunman, Nikolas Cruz, 19, appeared in court in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and was arraigned on a 34-count indictment in connection with the shooting rampage Feb. 14 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
Cruz did not speak and a plea of not guilty was entered on his behalf after state prosecutors filed notice that they would seek the death penalty in the case.
Bill Bowdich, the FBI’s acting deputy director, told the Senate panel that the agency erred whenit failed to follow up on a detailed warning on a tip line that Cruz was “going to explode.”
“We made mistakes here, no question about it,” Bowdich said. “That said, even if we had done everything right, I’m not sure we could have stopped the attack.”
He acknowledged that FBI agents missed an opportunity to question Cruz and to alert local law enforcement in Florida that he posed a possible danger. Cruz had been expelled from high school for disciplinary reasons and had been the subject of dozens of complaints to local police.
Bowdich said a close friend of the Cruz family had called the FBI’s tip center Jan. 8 with a “very explicit” warning, saying Cruz had purchased weapons, was mutilating small animals, had threatened his mother with a rifle and talked about the terrorist group Islamic State.
The tip center employee discussed the report with a supervisor but both agreed to close the matter without forwarding the report to FBI agents or to local police, Bowdich said.
An FBI agent also failed to follow up after Cruz posted a video on YouTube last September in which he vowed he was “going to be a professional school shooter.” Bowditch said the agent could not identify the person who posted the video, although Cruz had used his Katherine Posada, a teacher at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, testifies during a Senate panel hearing Wednesday about the Feb. 14 rampage, which left 17 dead in Parkland, Fla. real name.
None of the FBI agents or employees has been disciplined for what Bowditch described as “judgment calls.” He added, “These employees have due process like anyone else.”
Bowditch sought to spread the blame, however, saying that local law enforcement had made 30 to 40 visits to Cruz’s home after receiving reports of threats or other problems.
Lawmakers made clear their dismay, although they offered no clear solutions.
“It’s my impression that the man did everything but take out an ad in the paper saying ‘I’m going to kill someone,’ ” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.
Democratic senators said new laws are needed to improve background checks for gun purchases, and to ban the sale of assault-style semiautomatic weapons, even as they conceded that the proposals faced long odds of winning approval.
Several cited the long record of gun control bills that have died in Congress, including measures that were proposed after 20 students and six educators were massacred Dec. 14, 2012, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
Under existing law, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, known as the ATF, is barred from computerizing its gun ownership records. They are kept on paper instead, a move heavily promoted by gun-rights activists who seek to limit gun regulations.
Meanwhile, the House on Wednesday passed a bipartisan bill that provides grants to states to train teachers to be alert to threats of gun violence — but has no gun control provisions.
The White House said it would work with the Senate to pass the bill.
After the Parkland shooting, President Donald Trump vowed to defy the NRA and push for a comprehensive gun control bill that would raise the age limit to purchase rifles, impose near universal background checks and renew a ban on assaultstyle rifles.
Trump abandoned those promises Monday.
At the hearing Wednesday, Katherine Posada, a Marjory Stoneman Douglas teacher, recounted how students in her honors class were discussing Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” whenthe shooting erupted. They huddled in terror as she fought her panic.
She said Congress needed to act to control weapons — and that arming teachers was not the answer.
“The fact that a 19-yearold can go into a gun store and buy a semi-automatic weapon and a high-capacity magazine … that is insane to me,” she said.