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Tribune News Service

In childlike scrawl with stick-figure drawings, Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz has been writing love letters from jail to a young woman overseas.
In the letters, he proposes marriage, muses about having children and says he wants to name his sons after guns.
But he never mentions shooting 34 people in cold blood – killing 17 of them – at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
The South Florida Sun Sentinel obtained 46 pages of Cruz’s handwritten letters from the Broward state attorney’s office.
They are part of the legal case, as the state attorney seeks the death penalty against the now-20-year-old for the February 14, 2018, Parkland shooting.
The records did not include any letters to Cruz from the girl.
One year on, Florida remembers victims of Parkland school shooting
Cruz never mentions his own crime, saying in one of the letters that talking about it “would be a bad idea”.
But he does tell his female pen pal to listen to Pumped Up Kicks by the band Foster the People, a song about a school shooting that includes the lyrics “You’d better run, better run, outrun my gun. Better run, better run, faster than my bullet.”
Inexplicably, Cruz expresses hope he’ll one day be released from jail and have a family. Yet he faces the death penalty, and his lawyers already have offered life in prison without a chance of parole.

“I really want kids. I think of it all the time, you know the joy they bring,” he writes.
He said he would name his sons Kalashnikov, Makarov and Remington – all gun references – and “my wife can name the girls”.
Cruz’s letters are to a young woman in the United Kingdom named Miley, one of his cyber supporters, and her brother, Liam, and they are dated from mid-October 2018 to mid-November.
A young woman named Miley helped form a Facebook group soon after the shooting. It was called “The First Victim”, referring to Cruz. Her last name is not shown in the letters.
‘It’s disgusting!’: School massacre video game ‘Active Shooter’ is slammed by parents of children killed in Parkland killings
He says he isn’t sure he wants to remain alive.
“I wish life for me could have been different but it’s not. And a part of me is wishing it ends. End with the death (penalty), letting someone inject me with longlast sleep. Its kind of what I want but I’m unsure of myself so I’m just leting people save me from myself, saving me from something that I can never return from.”
Cruz says he thinks death will be “forever darkness or a flash of light”.

At the same time, Cruz muses about freedom, and a family.
“Would you be OK with me getting a crossbow if I lived with you? It would only be used for sporting and hunting.”
Cruz’s letters are rife with misspellings and childish drawings. A lifelong special education student, Cruz was thought to have autism.
Parkland student dies in ‘apparent suicide’ days after massacre survivor took her own life
He also was diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
In his letters, he said he wants Miley to attend his trial and suggests when she moves to Florida, she get a medical marijuana card and a concealed weapons license “cause it’s dangerous hear”.

“I also was wondering if you’d be interested in marriage when the time’s comes. It won’t be for a long time, but would you be interested? I feel like we make a great family together. With lots of kids. I imagine it every day. That’s what’s keeping me strong.”
He said he really wants to have a girlfriend even if the person is “miles away”.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me, maybe I should get the death penalty. IDK (I don’t know), I just want love … ”
“I hope you can understand it’s because of my mother,” he writes.
“I feel like I’ll never be loved and I’ll die alone.”
In a letter from November 1, 2018, he mentions the Pittsburgh shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue, where eight people died.
“I put my heart out to these victims and to the shooter because I believe they need all the support they can get,” he says.
Cruz talks about boredom, missing his mother and politics.

GUNS: Cruz said he’s “a huge Second Amendment supporter even though I’m here in jail for being on the wrong side of the law. I still believe it’s a special right to have and I try to encourage everyone including you to take part in it.”
HOLIDAYS: The Fourth of July is his favourite holiday. “I love fireworks and the explosions. It’s super fun.”
HALLOWEEN: “This will be the first year I won’t go trick or treating, unfortunately.” He said he dressed as a soldier last year, wearing body armour and a ballistic helmet. He took his dog Kobe with him.
His mother was in hospital. She died the next day.
POLITICS: Cruz wrote several times about the elections and his hope that Republicans would win – specifically Governor Ron DeSantis and Senator Rick Scott.
“I can’t spell his name but I know he’s Republican and I’m voting for him,” he wrote about DeSantis.
“I know if we get a Democratic governor he will take away our rights. … Please pray that Ron wins.”
“I really don’t like liberals. I don’t want them winning. They really are dangerous. They spread lies and are destroying America. We’re going to one day be the weakest country with the highest crime rates.” “Are you liberal or conservative? Let me know.”
OUTLOOK: “What is your outlook on life?” he asked in one letter.
“Mine is go live the best way you can. So please let me know. I really want to know all your dreams.”
SPORTS: “You’re probably wondering what my favourite sport is, well it’s hunting, and professional bull riding.”
GIRLS: “I also like girls with red hair and a positive outlook on life.”
COLOUR: His favourite colour is “Army green and woodland camouflage.”
JAIL LIFE: He said life in jail is boring.
“I watch TV and do homework.”
He said it’s easy to gain weight. Guards pat him down every four hours.
“What’s your day like?” he asks.
HOMELESSNESS: He said he liked helping the homeless and once gave a homeless man a cheeseburger and fries.
FOOD: He mentions in several letters that he puts peanut butter and jelly on meatball subs.
IMMIGRANTS: “I hear there’s a reason why wear trying to stop immigration and that’s (unreadable word). They attack people, destroy property’s and spread diseas.” He said he is waiting for the whole society to collapse “because of these issues.”
MEDIA: He asked if the news media in the United Kingdom is “like hear with a bunch of lies or are they honest?”
DIPLOMA: Cruz says he is working to get his high school equivalency, the GED.
EMOTIONS: “I’ve been dealing with my emotions heer in jail. Their is this one guard I don’t like but I’m behaving to the best of my ability but I’m starting to (unreadable word). Do you know any way how I can deal with that so I don’t get in trouble?”
GLASSES: He talks about having gained weight in jail and about getting new glasses that look like they’re from the 1960s.
“So don’t laugh at them when you see me on TV,” he writes.
Cruz regales the girl he’s never met with stories from his childhood, including a recent hunting trip with his friend, Hunter McCutcheon, during which he says he almost shot his friend’s father.
“We were shooting bug nest with bird shot. It was a lot of fun until he handed me shotgun and I almost shot him! He told me not to shoot but I did and I almost hit him but thank God I didn’t. He said to be more careful cause once I take a life there’s nothing that can be undone. Hunter was mad at me to but he got over it.”
Cruz wrote that his lawyers said Miley would attend his trial. He goes on to say he’s hungry and will be having a peanut butter sandwich.
Cruz seemed to retain hope he’d get out of jail one day.
“Since I am into your sister maybe we can go on a double date,” he wrote to Miley’s brother, Liam.
In another, he talked about spending time in the Everglades.
“I wish you could experience it with me. Maybe one day.”
“I hate it hear,” he wrote in another letter.
“I wish I could leave and move to the mountains and live alone with some equipment that allow me to live off the land. I hope one day I’ll be able to do that, but time will tell.”


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Gun violence in the US

Parkland school shooter Nikolas  Cruz writes disturbing love letters from jail to ‘Miley’: I want to name my sons after guns

Parkland school shooter Nikolas Cruz. Photo: AP

In childlike scrawl with stick-figure drawings, Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz has been writing love letters from jail to a young woman overseas. Photos: Broward State Attorney's Office

Parkland school suspect Nikolas Cruz enters the courtroom for a hearing at the Broward Courthouse in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Friday, April 5, 2019. Attorneys for Cruz, the suspect in last year's Florida high school massacre, want to waive his attendance at pretrial hearings. (Amy Beth Bennett/South Florida Sun Sentinel via AP, Pool)

Students are evacuated by police out of Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., after a shooting on Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2018. The Department of Homeland Security could not use two big federal grant programs to pay for arming teachers, thanks to a provision tucked into House legislation that quietly passed this week. (Mike Stocker/Sun Sentinel/TNS)

Love letters: Parkland school shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz never mentions shooting 34 people in cold blood – killing 17 of them – at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Photo: AP

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Nikolas Cruz shot dead 14 students and three staff members at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last year
In the letters, Cruz proposes marriage, muses about having children and says he ‘kind of’ wants to die by lethal injection


In the letters, Parkland gunman Nikolas Cruz proposes marriage, muses about having children and says he wants to name his sons after guns.
