On February 14, 2018, then 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz walked into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida –  the school he had previously been expelled from – and shot 17 students and teachers, injured an additional 17 people, and left countless others traumatized throughout the community.

Cruz first pulled fire alarms at around 2:20 p.m. to lure students and faculty into the hallways. At 2:21 p.m., shots began. 7 minutes later, at 2:28 p.m., Cruz fled from the building, disguised in the crowd of his victims. He wandered over to a Walmart nearby and bought himself a drink, then sat down in a McDonald’s before he was arrested. At the time, this was the deadliest school shooting since Sandy Hook but has recently been surpassed by the Robb Elementary shooting in Uvalde, TX. 

Last year, he pled guilty to 17 charges of premeditated murder and 17 charges of attempted murder. Cruz, now 24, has been spared the death penalty and is serving life in prison without parole. In Florida, the jury must agree unanimously to put someone to death, and some unnamed jurors voted against it. They felt that because Cruz had been diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome, a term for  a number of conditions that can occur if a person’s mother drank alcohol during pregnancy – a claim the prosecution disputes – and was bullied throughout his years in school, he wasn’t fully in control of his actions. This verdict has left the families of the victims devastated, many of whom believe he deserves the death penalty.

We are a generation marked by school shootings. From Columbine to Sandy Hook to Uvalde, each one is another tragedy that we have to look in the face. I asked students what they remember of this attack and others, and how they feel about the sentencing. Something to note is that many of the people I’ve mentioned in this article to have asked me for specifics on which shooting this was. 

“I think that people don’t take gun violence as seriously as they should. Even at this school, where we have security, it’s still a very real fear, and it’s something that should be taken with caution.” -Jenny Blackwell ‘23

“Personally, I don’t f*ck with guns, and the fact that they [the guns] have more rights than me pisses me off! Also the US has so many issues with shootings because we don’t have a lot of restrictions on guns which literally could solve the issue. Personally, I think the sentencing is fair, like you made the decision to shoot your classmates and that’s the consequence for your actions. Personally I’m not the biggest fan of the death penalty so I feel that life without parole is fair.” – Anonymous

“I think that it’s become too big of a problem in America today, and I don’t think the government is doing what they should be doing about it. And I think it’s too much of a problem for kids as young as five years old to attend school and fear for their lives every day. In the Parkland shooting, Cruz was a severely mentally unstable kid who was able to legally buy and modify a gun to make it deadly. That in itself is a gross reality of how little gun ownership is regulated. In regard to his sentencing, I think life in prison without parole is the way to go and I’m glad that was the ruling. He should sit with the fact he murdered 17 people as he rots, he doesn’t deserve an easy way out.” – Kendra Delgado ‘23

“Maybe I’m cruel, but I think he should have to live the rest of his life for what he did, and endure any mental suffering that may come with it for as long as he lives. Death is letting him off too easy. For the lives he ended, he should have to live out his own and endure the consequences of his actions. It’s definitely important to acknowledge though that the jury did want to pursue the death penalty, and that ended up just not happening. While I disagree with the verdict, I think this is a failure of the justice system.” – AJ Reyes ‘23