Parkland Shooter’s Mother “Enabled” Gun Purchases

The Associated Press reports:

Mental health counselors told the mother of Florida school shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz she shouldn’t let him buy guns, but she ignored their concerns and he began assembling an arsenal before her death last year, officials said Tuesday. Lynda Cruz was “an enabler” who interfered with efforts to get her son treatment, Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri, chairman of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission, told members.

About a year before the attack, Nikolas Cruz was 18 and living with his mother when he legally bought the AR-15 authorities say was used in the Feb. 14 shooting that killed 17 people. He bought other guns before and after her November death from pneumonia.

“If he wants to have a gun, he could have a gun,” Gualtieri said Lynda Cruz told his counselors. Cruz’s father died when he was young. Gualtieri told members that school and mental health counselors had at least 140 contacts with Nikolas Cruz over the years trying to get him help, but his mother frequently interfered.