Shooter’s brother amends complaint
Legal action shifts from sheriff’s office to ankle monitor company.
FORT LAUDERDALE — Zachary Cruz has withdrawn a court motion to hold the Broward County Sheriff ’s probation chief in contempt of court.
Cruz’s attorney filed court papers last month alleging that David Scharf, the leader of BSO’s probation department, had overstepped by ordering that Cruz’s ankle monitor go off whenever he entered Broward County, even though that restriction was not a condition of his probation.
Cruz, 18, is the younger brother of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooter Nikolas Cruz.
Zachary Cruz was placed on probation for trespassing after he was caught in March on the Parkland’s school campus, where his brother shot and killed 17 people in February.
It was also Scharf who followed Cruz into Palm Beach County on April 28 and filed an affidavit that Cruz had violated his probation by driving near Park Vista High School in suburban Boynton Beach. Cruz was also cited for driving without a valid license.
A judge ruled May 11 there was no evidence that Cruz violated his probation by driving near Park Vista.
“It is clear Mr. Scharf has a personal vendetta against Mr. Cruz, and someone wielding such power creates an environment where Mr. Cruz simply has no possibility of successful completion of probation,” the motion read.
But Cruz’s legal team reversed course this week. In court documents filed Tuesday afternoon, attorney Mark S. Lowry asks that the contempt motion against Scharf be withdrawn and that a hearing that was set for today in Broward County Circuit Court be canceled.
Mike Donovan, whose Virginia-based company has provided Cruz with a job and a place to live and covered his legal costs, confirmed Wednesday the motion against Scharf has been withdrawn.
Donovan said a lawsuit against House Arrest Services, which provided Cruz with his ankle bracelet and monitors his activity, will be filed within 24 hours.
After further consideration, Donovan said, it was House Arrest Services that was liable for Cruz’s ankle monitor activating while he visited his mother’s gravesite in Broward County on Mother’s Day.
When a monitor is activated, law enforcement is notified and it can lead to an arrest for violation of probation.
“We don’t care who is at fault as long as this behavior stops,” Donovan said.
Court documents filed Tuesday
by Scharf ’s attorney asked that the contempt motion be dismissed and singled out an employee of the ankle monitoring company as the person who initiated a series of phone calls with Scharf alerting him that Cruz had entered Broward County.
Cruz was permitted by a judge to move last month to Virginia from suburban Lantana, where he had lived at a family friend’s mobile home. He continues to serve a six-month probation term for trespassing at Stoneman Douglas.
The Miami Herald reported Monday that Cruz recently sent a photo to his probation officer that shows the 18-year-old driving.
Attached to the photo was a copy of his driver’s permit from the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles.
A Broward judge had warned Cruz not to drive without a license during his probation violation hearing in May.
Donovan said that Cruz failed in his first attempt to get his Virginia license, but was successful the second time.
“He’s driving everywhere,” Donovan said.