Parkland shooting

The law that raised the minimum gun purchase age to 21 was passed as part of a gun reform package following the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, which was one of the deadliest shootings in the country.

“You never think it’s going to happen to you the first time, you certainly never think it’s going to happen to you twice,” said Stephanie Horowitz, a 22-year-old graduate student at Florida State University.

The Republican-controlled House voted 78-34 to pass the bill (HB 759), though it remains unclear whether the Senate will take up the issue. The House passed repeal bills in 2023 and 2024, but they did not get through the Senate.

Years after the shooting at the South Florida high school, where a gunman killed 17 people and injured 17 more, lawmakers are still grappling with how far gun control laws should go to prevent these kinds of tragedies.

The Parkland and Coral Springs community show support every year at the vigil, upholding their vow to forever honor the memory of those killed in the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Under an agreement signed by Circuit Judge Carol-Lisa Phillips, survivor Anthony Borges, the families of slain students Meadow Pollack, Luke Hoyer and Alaina Petty and fellow student survivor Maddy Wilford now control any attempt by shooter Nikolas Cruz to profit off his name or likeness or grant interviews. Each of the five parties has veto power.

Former Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer told the Florida International University law students Thursday that the public defenders who represented Nikolas Cruz during his 2022 death penalty trial says they “lost their minds” as they defended him for the killing of 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

A nasty rift between the most seriously wounded survivor of the 2018 Parkland school massacre and some families of the 17 murdered has erupted in court.

The parents of Luke Hoyer, Alaina Petty and Meadow Pollack each reached $50 million settlements with the shooter. Wounded student Maddy Wilford agreed to a $40 million settlement.

The most severely wounded survivor of the 2018 massacre at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School now owns shooter Nikolas Cruz’s name.

Six years later, the site of one of the worst school shootings in the nation is getting demolished — but with it, comes mixed feelings in the Parkland community, who want to remember victims while letting go of painful memories.

Demolition of the building where 17 people died in the 2018 Parkland school shooting is set to begin. The three-story building at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School had been kept as evidence in the 2022 trial of the killer and last year's trial of a sheriff's deputy who didn't enter it and confront him.