FORT LAUDERDALE – Multiple witnesses were called by the state again for day eight of the sentencing trial for the Parkland school shooter Nikolas Cruz.
The first witness to take the stand was Sgt. Raymond Beltran of the Broward County Sheriff’s Office. He was working in the main jail where Cruz was being held when they got into an altercation.
It was captured on surveillance video and shows Beltran and Cruz in a scuffle, rolling around on the ground. Beltran said Cruz was dragging his feet on the ground because his slides were broken. He said he told Cruz to get a new pair. That’s when Cruz reportedly gave him the middle finger and charged at him.
Beltran testified that Cruz got ahold of his Taser.
“At this point, I have to get the Taser back. He could tase me he could incapacitate me,” he told the jury.
He ended up gaining control of the situation and handcuffing Cruz who was lying face down on the ground.
The next witness to be called to the stand was Broward Sheriff’s Detective Kevin Forsberg who found Cruz’s cell phone in the east stairwell of the first floor of the 1200 building at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
“I was about the midway point of the hallway. I started calling that phone to see if I could hear it anywhere in the hallway. I heard it faintly. Sounded like it was coming from the east location of the hallway. I continued calling it multiple times until I got to the east end of the hallway and then I could hear that it was coming from inside the stairwell location on the first floor,” he said.
We can likely expect to hear about the contents found on Cruz’s phone including the cell phone video he recorded just days before the massacre saying he would be the next school shooter.
