By Steve Neavling
The federal government has agreed to pay the families of victims of the 2018 Parkland shooting massacre $127.5 million. The families alleged in lawsuits that the FBI failed to act on tips that may have prevented the shooting, the Justice Department said in a statement Wednesday.
“The settlement does not amount to an admission of fault by the United States,” the DOJ said.
The shooting occurred on Feb. 14, 2018, at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, where Nikolas Cruz killed 17 people and wounded an additional 17.
The settlement will go to 16 of the 17 families of those killed. One of the families opted not to sue.
The families accused the FBI of negligence for failing to act on tips about Cruz. One came about five weeks before the shooting, when a tipster said Cruz had purchased guns and planned to “slip into a school and start shooting the place up.”
The tip never made its way to the FBI’s South Florida office, and the bureau never contacted Cruz, who had a troubling history of mental and behavioral problems.
Cruz, who pleaded guilty to 17 counts of first-degree murder in October 2021, faces a death sentence or life in prison when he is sentenced in April.
