As in the months before the 9/11 attacks — when "the system was blinking red" but various arms of the federal government failed to connect the dots — Broward County Sheriff’s Office, the FBI and a Florida social service agency had troubling tips or encounters involving school shooter Nikolas Cruz.
That information didn’t simply fall through cracks. It was crying out for follow-up. Different people made decisions not to do anything about it.
No one can say for certain that following those leads would have prevented the tragedy in which 17 people died. But that doesn’t absolve officials for failing to look into those tips with greater diligence.
The sheriff’s office had received calls going back nearly 10 years about Cruz, 19. Sheriff Scott Israel says there were 23 calls; CNN obtained records showing a total of 45. Regardless of the number, the reports grew more unnerving over the years,from a report of Cruz fighting with his younger brother to one about throwing his mother against a wall.
The most alarming calls piled up during the past two years.
In 2016, a neighbor warned the sheriff’s office of an Instagram post in which Cruz said he “planned to shoot up the school.” Months later came a report that Cruz might have tried to commit suicide. A law enforcement officer, assigned to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High as a "resource deputy,” initiated a report. The school said it would do a “threat assessment,” and a private therapist on the scene said Cruz was not a danger to himself or others.
The Florida Department of Children and Families came to a similar conclusion. Had Cruz been pegged as a danger, that might have triggered a court-ordered commitment to a mental health facility. It never got that far.
Source:
usatoday
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