OC Man Sentenced In Cyberstalking Parkland Victim's Families

ORANGE COUNTY, CA — A Santa Ana resident will spend 66 months in federal prison for cyberstalking and threatening to kidnap families of the victims of the Parkland mass shooting incident, the U.S. Attorney's office says.

On February 14, 2018, a mass shooting event occurred at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Park. Seventeen people were killed and 17 others wounded, their families left to pick up the pieces. Following that event, taunts and threats sent by Brandon Fleury through fake Instagram accounts left many surviving family members feeling terrorized. The FBI immediately investigated, and Fleury was identified and arrested weeks later.

Evidence introduced during the South Florida jury trial showed Fleury used 13 different Instagram accounts. His aliases included the alleged Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz, notorious serial killer Ted Bundy, and others. According to the FBI, he targeted families and friends of Parkland shooting victims with messages about the deaths of their loved ones over the course of three weeks between Dec. 22, 2018 and Jan. 11, 2019.
Many of the messages, including ones written under usernames referring to Cruz, contained Cruz's profile picture.
On Dec. 25, 2018, Fleury, sent a message stating, "I'm your abductor I'm kidnapping you fool."

On Jan. 9, 10, and 11, 2019, Fleury continued to harass, intimidate, and threaten the message recipients from multiple Instagram accounts.

According to court documents, Fleury also sent messages under the username "the.douglas.shooter." He used a profile picture of Nikolas Cruz and made statements such as, "With the power of my AR-15, you all die," and "With the power of my AR-15, I take your loved ones away from you PERMANENTLY."

Law enforcement officers found thousands of saved images on examination of Fleury's tablets. According to court records, he saved pictures of Ted Bundy, the targeted victims, and screenshots of the messages that he had sent the victims.
Fleury was convicted of interstate transmission of a threat to kidnap, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 875(c), and interstate cyberstalking, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 2261A (Case No. 19cr60056).

He was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Rudolfo A. Ruiz II to 60 months as to Counts 1-3 to run concurrently and six months as to Count 4, to run consecutive to Counts 1-3.

U.S. Attorney Fajardo Orshan commended the investigatory efforts of the FBI's South Florida Violent Crime Fugitive Task Force and Broward Sheriff's Office in this matter. U.S. Attorney Fajardo Orshan also thanked the FBI's Los Angeles Field Office and task force members. Assistant U.S. Attorney Ajay Alexander prosecuted this case.