Zachary Cruz, the younger brother of the gunman who killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in February, says he wants to start an anti-bullying campaign and thinks bullying affected his brother's actions.
"Because my brother didn't really fit in with a lot of people and I saw the effects of that, like, firsthand," Zachary Cruz he said, according to CNN. "It's a real issue, so I just want to try to change that."
Gunman Nikolas Cruz is Zachary Cruz's adopted brother. Zachary previously told authorities he bullied Nikolas when they were younger. "I felt like I was bullying him a little bit at times, like I felt like I was a little too hard on him at times," Cruz said, recounting their childhoods. "He was a very, like, fragile person, so...my mom was always there for him." The brothers’ mother Lynda Cruz died in November 2017.
According to CNN, Cruz expressed guilt about not preventing the mass attack, a sentiment he shared again on Sunday. "There's a lot of things I wish I could have did to prevent it," he said. "I wish I could have stopped it somehow."
"I want to end bullying because it's so dumb," Cruz continued. "Like, everybody, like, deserves to fit in...You shouldn't just, I don't know, exclude someone because they're different."
Cruz played no part in his brother’s shooting but has had his own run-ins with the law after receiving a misdemeanor trespassing charge for skateboarding at Marjory Stoneman Douglas in March. He was sentenced to six months' probation but will be serving the rest of his sentence in Virginia, where Zachary's moving for a counseling and job assistance program. Cruz hopes the move to Virginia will give him a fresh start after the Parkland shooting. There he says he wants to "finish high school, work on this bullying thing that I want to do, and just live my life.”
