The younger brother of Nikolas Cruz, the 19-year-old who killed 17 people in a school shooting in Parkland, Florida on Wednesday, has been involuntarily committed to a psychiatric facility according to the Palm Beach Post.
Zachary, who turns 18 next week, was staying at a suburban home in Lantana, Florida during the shooting. According to Palm Beach County Sheriff deputies, he was removed from the house and sent to the psychiatric facility for treatment on Friday.
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The Cruz brother’s adoptive mother Lynda had passed away back in November after a case of the flu turned to pneumonia. The two had been staying with Rocxanne Deschamps, a family friend, but Cruz later moved into the house of a family of a former classmate after he and Rocxanne had a disagreement over the 19-year-old having guns in her house. It has not be determined whether or not Cruz brought in the AR-15 semi-automatic rifle he legally purchased in February 2017 and used it to kill 14 students and three teachers at Stoneman Douglas High School.
Zachary was committed under Florida’s Baker Act, where he can be held involuntarily for up to 12 hours for a psychological exam.
Reports came out days after the shooting that the police had been called to Lynda Cruz’s household 39 times since 2010, with causes ranging from domestic disturbance to child-elderly abuse.
“The more we learn, the more we realize just what a life this kid, this shooter, was living,” CNN reporter Drew Griffin told anchor Don Lemon. “We’ve got records tonight from Brower County Sheriff of all the times the police were called to this family’s home over the past several years and it is extensive. We have records that show 39 times police were called to this one particular home where the shooter lived with his family since 2010. The calls, as delineated by the records, are for things like ‘mentally ill person,’ ‘domestic disturbance,’ many 9-1-1 hang-up calls, a ‘child-elderly abuse’ call, some for missing person calls. These are year-after-year, weekend after weekend, according to the neighbors, of police interacting with this family, with this shooter’s family. We don’t have the records behind this list, so we don’t know why all the calls were made.”
Along with a series of threatening posts on social media, a tip to the FBI and comments made by other students at the school prior to Cruz’s expulsion last year, authorities admit there were plenty of missed warning signs ahead of the shooting.
