Posted on 02/15/2018 8:13:56 AM PST by xzins
Nikolas Cruz, the suspect in Wednesday’s horrific massacre at a Florida high school, was allegedly reported to the FBI in September after he left a comment on a bail bondsman’s YouTube channel saying that he was going to be a “professional school shooter.”
The former student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School had previously been expelled for disciplinary problems prior to the mass shooting that left 17 people dead.
In a YouTube video published on the evening of the attack, Ben Bennight, a Mississippi bondsman, explained that he was contacted by the FBI at approximately 3 p.m. about a comment on one of his videos that he had reported last fall.
“The FBI just left my house in regards to this situation,” Bennight stated. “September 24th 2017, I sent a screenshot of a comment on one of my videos — now people keep asking me which video was it, but I don’t know, I don’t remember what video it was — when I saw the comment come through on my Studio app on my iPhone I screenshot the comment and hit the report button to report it to YouTube. Of course, they removed the comment.”
The video then scrolled through the screenshot and his report to YouTube.
Bennight proceeded to report the comment to the FBI.
“I looked up the number to my local field office and I called and left them a message. The next day I had two FBI agents standing in my office taking down the information and copies of the screenshot. They were asking me questions that of course I couldn’t answer. All it was on my channel was a comment, people leave pretty heinous comments on a pretty regular basis,” Bennight continued.
“This comment said ‘I am going to be a professional school shooter’ and I knew that I could not just ignore that,” he said. “I screenshotted the comment, I sent it to the appropriate authorities — and I imagine that from there they did a pretty thorough investigation and tried to find out who this person was,” he explained.
The bondsman continued on to explain that the YouTube comment did not come from an anonymous account, but from one with the name Nikolas Cruz.
“It wasn’t a generic screen name, the screen name was Nikolas Cruz — which I’m sure as you know by now, is the name of the guy that did the shooting in Florida today,” Bennight said.
Bennight explained that the first contact from the FBI today came in a phone call from his local field office shortly after the shooting. He stated that an agent called him, asked where he was and asserted that he was on his way to his house. Immediately after that, he says that he received a call from an agent from the Miami field office.
“I called him back and he’s like, ‘hey, you know, I’m just following up on a report that you made a couple months back’ — and I was like yeah, I just got off the phone with an agent over here,” Bennight said. “I emailed the Miami agent everything I had — well, everything I had was just that screenshot.”
Within an hour, the agent from his local office was at his home.
When the agent arrived at his home, he was questioned about if he had any previous contact with Cruz, which he says he did not. He was also questioned about how his report was handled at the time.
“I would like to think they were already investigating this guy and they had him at the top of their radar and that’s how they ended up contacting me so quickly,” Bennight said. “I wish I could have given them more information, but it was just a comment on my channel.”
The YouTube channel as well as all other social media belonging to Cruz appeared to have been taken offline by Wednesday evening.
Cruz was a known mental case, menace. He made threats.
They were reported.
What else is needed?
there goes the “if you see something, say something” theory
WAIT...WAIT... FBI IS BUSY ON RUSSIA COLLUSION !!
So “see something say something” is just a big joke...or the FBI had everyone working to try and “verify the dossier”?
They were reported to the FBI.
God only knows what the FBI did with that information. “Encourage him on” is as likely a course of action as any, given the individuals in decision-making capacities in that agency.
They were far too busy doing illegal monitoring of politicians...
To be busy trying to frame a president.
Apparently the FBI was too busy looking into Trump’s Russian connections.
The FBI guy was just on the news about this and said they got nowhere with it..
I think is CYA time at the FBI...they said they had no name..
but the guy said he gave them a name..
If some one posts with no name can it be traced ???
Know nothing about computer science
those two FBI lovers had 50,000 text messages from 6 months time period. How is there time for anything else?
When did the FBI give him the Rifle and how long were they grooming him for this event??
FBI dropped the ball and 17 people are dead
Were they too busy texting hate messages about Pres Trump?
The screen capture sort of proves the fbi had a name.
You really got to wonder what they were thinking on this one.
Across the spectrum from teachers to neighbors to social media, this guy was KNOWN and identified.
CRAZY!
Eric Holder shipped it to him from a Mexican gun shop???
I guess the FBI was too busy investigating Trump and his associates to investigate a potential mass murderer.
According to FBI Director Wray, you are undermining LE with that comment. You are such a meanie!! You should know better than to criticize public institutions that Dems find it in their interest to temporarily adopt.
Great the FBI was notified.
Too busy investigating Trump I guess.
I know we’re constantly reminded that the vast majority of the FBI are great cops. I believe that.
But the dipwads are out there, and they’re ruining the reputation of the rest.
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