UNREAL

Parkland Shooter Writes Love Letters from Jail, Says He’ll Name His Kids After Guns

Letters written by Nikolas Cruz are now part of the legal case being brought forth by the Broward State Attorney’s Office.

Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz has been writing love letters while in jail to a young woman overseas, proposing marriage and future sons that he says he wants to name after his guns, the South Florida Sun Sentinel reports. Forty-six pages of letters written by Cruz—who shot 34 people in February 2018 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, killing 17 of them—are now part of the legal case being brought forth by Broward State Attorney’s Office, which is seeking the death penalty. The records did not include any letters to Cruz from the girl. Cruz, now 20, never mentions his crime other than to say talking about it “would be a bad idea.” But he does tell the girl to listen to Foster the People’s “Pumped Up Kicks,” a song with the line: “You’d better run, better run, outrun my gun. Better run, better run, faster than my bullet.” Cruz also wrote he hopes to one day be released from jail and start a family. “I really want kids,” he wrote. “I think of it all the time, you know the joy they bring,” noting that he would name his sons Kalashnikov, Makarov, and Remington—all names of guns—and “my wife can name the girls.” Cruz faces the death penalty, and his lawyers have offered a possible deal of life in prison without a chance of parole.

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