The Adults of the Jury Have Spoken

A lot of adults who take money to protect children -- minors under 18 years of age -- failed them in Florida.  Shed no tears for Nikolas Cruz, but make no mistake -- he wasn't the sole reason for the deaths of all those Stoneman-Douglas students.  People took money, made it their livelihoods, and the system failed them.  Break the cycle, not the children:

Parkland school shooting jury spares gunman death penalty in 2018 massacre

The sentence caps an emotional three-month trial in which victim relatives and survivors recounted the 2018 Valentine’s Day massacre in painful detail.

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FORT LAUDERDALE — After an emotional three months in the courtroom, a jury Thursday showed mercy to the Parkland school shooter, recommending he spend life in prison and not be executed for the heinous murders.

The recommendation is binding. The judge does not have the discretion to impose the death penalty, now that at least one juror found that shooter Nikolas Cruz should not be executed. The jury deliberated for just seven hours before coming back with the decision.

Cruz will be formally sentenced on Nov. 1. The victims have the right to speak at that hearing, giving their input on what penalty they thought was appropriate.

Killed in the Feb. 14, 2018, shooting were Luke Hoyer, 15; Martin Duque, 14; Gina Montalto, 14; Alex Schachter, 14; Alaina Petty, 14; Alyssa Alhadeff, 14; Nicholas Dworet, 17; Helena Ramsay, 17; Chris Hixon, 49; Carmen Schentrup, 16; Aaron Feis, 37; Scott Beigel, 35; Meadow Pollack, 18; Cara Loughran, 14; Joaquin Oliver, 17; Jaime Guttenberg, 14; and Peter Wang, 15.