FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Jurors at the upcoming trial of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School mass shooter still will get a chance to visit the scene of the crime, even though the killer’s guilt is no longer in question, Broward Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer has ruled.
Lawyers defending confessed killer Nikolas Cruz, who pleaded guilty last October to 17 counts of murder and 17 counts of attempted murder in the Feb. 14, 2018 mass shooting, had argued that the site visit was no longer necessary and would only inflame the passions of the jury, which will be tasked with recommending whether Cruz is sentenced to life in prison or death by lethal injection.
Scherer had originally approved a site visit as part of the first phase of the trial, which was rendered moot when Cruz pleaded guilty.
The crime scene was the 1200 building of the Stoneman Douglas campus in Parkland, commonly called the freshman building, which Cruz calmly walked into shortly before dismissal on Valentine’s Day, assembled his AR-15 style rifle, and opened fire on the unsuspecting, terrified student body.
Prosecutors argued that the site visit is necessary to convey aspects of the crime that need to be proved beyond a reasonable doubt in order to justify a death sentence. Those aspects include whether the crime was “heinous, atrocious and cruel” and whether it was committed in a “cold and calculated” manner.
Defense lawyers argued those elements can be inferred from other evidence in the case, including crime scene photographs and surveillance video that shows Cruz committing the murders.
“A jury view of the crime scene remains useful and proper,” Scherer wrote in a ruling dated last Thursday.
As a concession to the guilty pleas, prosecutors withdrew a request to have the jury follow the path Cruz took after he left the building and headed to a nearby Walmart and a fast-food restaurant.
The building has not been used since the shooting, and it has been replaced, but the school district cannot demolish the old building until prosecutors no longer need it to preserve the evidence for trial.
The process of jury selection in the mass shooting case got underway Monday morning and is expected to last two months.
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