BuzzFeed News dropped a bombshell today with a report that the FBI received a warning last fall from a YouTube vlogger and bail bondsman about a comment from a Nikolas Cruz. He supposedly said, “I’m going to be a professional school shooter.”
19-year-old Nikolas Cruz attacked students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida on Wednesday and killed 17 people. Officials charged him with 17 counts of premeditated murder on Thursday.
From BuzzFeed:
The YouTuber, 36-year-old Ben Bennight, alerted the FBI, emailing a screenshot of the comment and calling the bureau’s Mississippi field office. He also flagged the comment to YouTube, which removed it from the video.Agents with the bureau’s Mississippi field office got back to him “immediately,” Bennight said, and conducted an in-person interview the following day, on Sept. 25.”They came to my office the next morning and asked me if I knew anything about the person,” Bennight told BuzzFeed News. “I didn’t. They took a copy of the screenshot and that was the last I heard from them.”FBI agents contacted Bennight again Wednesday, after a 19-year-old named Nikolas Cruz allegedly opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in South Florida, killing at least 17 people.
The BBC has reported that the FBI confirmed they received Bennight’s email and while they conducted checks on the YouTube user, they “were unable to identify the person behind it.” Bennight spoke to NBC News about it:
He suggested he was not convinced the FBI had dropped the ball, saying he did not know “that there was much they could have followed up with” after getting a tip about a “screen name and a vague comment.”But he added: “I hope people learn that when somebody throws up red flags, that they need to pay more attention to them and not just … scoff ’em off.”
Jake Tapper had more:
Administrators at the school have long considered Cruz a threat. The school expelled him for reasons officials have not said, but administrators told teachers and staff last year that Cruz was not allowed “on the campus with a backpack:”
Math teacher Jim Gard remembered that the school administration earlier sent out an email warning teachers about Cruz.“We were told last year that he wasn’t allowed on campus with a backpack on him,” said Gard, who had him in class. “There were problems with him last year threatening students, and I guess he was asked to leave campus.”
The Miami Herald wrote that people who knew Cruz said he “was into weird stuff” and never spoke much. His now-deleted Instagram page had tons of photos of weapons. One post even had Allahu Akbar in Arabic, but officials still believe the shooting had nothing to do with terrorism. NBC News reported that some students said they even “joked that if anyone were to attack the school, it would probably be him.” Senior Eddie Bonilla said that Cruz often “threatened to bring guns to school.”
Lynda and Roger Cruz adopted Nikolas and his younger brother when the kids were really young. Roger died ten years ago and Lynda struggled with the two boys. Lynda recently died and Nikolas moved in with a friend:
After his mother died, Cruz moved in with a friend, whose family in Broward took him in and even gave him own bedroom. He worked at a dollar store and went to a school for at-risk youth, said Fort Lauderdale attorney Jim Lewis, who is representing the family.Cruz had his AR-15, but the family asked that gun remain locked up in a cabinet, Lewis said. On Wednesday morning, Cruz slept in and gave only a cryptic reason why.“He said, ‘It’s Valentine’s Day and I don’t go to school on Valentine’s Day,’” Lewis said.
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