Florida school shooter Nikolas Cruz was caught on camera aiming a fake gun at his head as he spat out ‘kill me’ during his lengthy police interrogation.
The disturbing video was released by prosecutors on Wednesday after they previously made public a transcript of the interview, which was conducted just hours after the February 14 shooting that killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
Both the video and footage were edited to remove Cruz’s direct confession to the massacre.
He claims a demonic voice in his head urged him to do violence.
Disturbing video of Florida school shooter Nikolas Cruz’s police interrogation was released Wednesday, showing him aiming a fake gun at his head as he pretended to kill himself
The nearly 12 hours of video show Cruz and Broward Sheriff’s Detective John Curcio in a police interrogation room, with the camera angle from above.
Cruz, dressed in hospital clothing and not handcuffed, initially speaks so softly Curcio repeatedly urges him to talk louder.
Much of their conversation focused on what the 19-year-old insisted was a voice he had been hearing for years that told him things like ‘burn, kill, destroy’.
Cruz also mutters ‘kill me, just f***ing kill me’ when Curcio is out of the room.
At one point when Cruz is left alone in the room, he was captured on camera repeatedly making a gun motion with his hand and pretending to shoot himself in the head and chest.
The video and redacted 200-page transcript of Cruz’s post-shooting statement were released after a judge ruled last month that non-confession portions should be made public.
Details of the shooting are blacked out, but the transcript is wide-ranging, dealing with the death of Cruz’s parents, his penchant for killing animals, his former girlfriend, his brother, guns, suicide attempts and, especially, the voice.
The transcript of Cruz’s interrogation (seen here in April) shows that he spat out ‘kill me’ and cursed as he sat alone in a sheriff’s interrogation room hours after the massacre
The detective asked if the supposed voice had given specific instructions related to the massacre, including the fact that Cruz took an Uber to the high school.
Curcio asked: ‘The voice didn’t tell you to take Uber, right?’
Cruz replied: ‘Yes, it did.’
The teenager went on to say that he had tried to kill himself twice before the massacre because the voice had told him to.
He tried to overdose on ibuprofen after the death of his mother in November.He told Curcio the voice appeared after his father died about 15 years ago but got worse after his mother died in November.
Cruz described the voice as a male, about his age, and that the only person he ever told about it was his brother.
Cruz also admitted to taking drugs like Xanax and marijuana.
According to the transcript, Cruz told the detective he bought the AR-15 for $560 from a gun shop and purchased the ammunition online. He estimated spending about $4,000 on weaponry. He said he bought the rifle because it was ‘cool looking’.
When he was left alone again in the interview room, Cruz told himself: ‘I want to die’.
‘At the end, you’re nothing but worthless s**t, dude. You deserve to die because you’re f***ing worthless and you f***ing (unintelligible) everyone. I want to die.’
Cruz’s attorneys have said he would plead guilty in exchange for a sentence of life without parole. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
Cruz made the 12-hour statement to Curcio shortly after the February 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School