MIAMI — When Mike Satz stood up and approached the jury, he did not raise his voice, bellow about justice or dramatically point his finger at the mass murderer seated a few feet away.
Instead, the career prosecutor calmly delivered an exhaustive account of Nikolas Cruz’s 2018 rampage through a Parkland high school. Satz recalled the number of Cruz’s cellphone used to make videos promising violence, the positioning of each hallway surveillance camera in the freshman building, the number of bullet wounds suffered by each of the 17 murder victims.
He did it all without consulting a single note. Satz even described Cruz’s Smith & Wesson M&P 15 with precision. “TF16214 is the serial number,” Satz told jurors during his opening statement on July 18.
That level of recall would be impressive for any lawyer, but Satz is no ordinary assistant state attorney. He spent 44 years as Broward County’s elected state attorney, running a large government agency while also personally trying some of the most high-profile killers — a rarity for top prosecutors. He also happens to be 80 years old.
But his performance in the opening two weeks of perhaps the most high-profile murder trial in Broward County history has clearly gotten the state off to a strong start as it seeks to execute one of Florida’s worst mass murderers. Satz’s courtroom command — understated, methodical, meticulous — comes as no surprise to many who have watched him work some of the county’s most violent cases over the decades.
“He had many years to work on and memorize the opening. It was powerful in its content and its message,” said veteran Miami death-penalty defense attorney Philip Reizenstein, who is not involved in the case. “And part of the message Satz conveyed by memorizing it — including gun serial numbers and Cruz’s phone number — was that the prosecutors and police had overlooked nothing. No detail was too small and he wants to convey that to the jury so they will trust the prosecution in being thorough.”
Penalty phase
This trial won’t be settling whether Cruz did the crime. In October, he pleaded guilty to 17 counts of first-degree murder, and 17 counts of attempted murder for the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High on Feb. 14, 2018. Instead, the 12-person jury will decide whether Cruz should be executed for the massacre, or sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole.
The “penalty phase” trial has moved briskly — by the end of Tuesday, jurors had heard from 47 witnesses overall, including wounded students and teachers, medical examiners, crime-scene technicians, the gun-shop owner who sold Cruz the AR-15 rifle and even the Uber driver who gave Cruz a ride to the campus.
Satz, who leads the five-prosecutor team, has so far done the questioning for every single state witness.
Tuesday marked the seventh day of testimony, and it’s not unusual for parents of the murdered students to warmly greet Satz as he walks slowly from the courtroom when court recesses. Much of the testimony is excruciating, details of wounds and memories of friends dying, and the pain is often palpable in the courtroom. Relatives in the gallery tear up every day.
Satz’s strategy seems to be that there is no need to oversell grief and loss to jurors. His questioning is sparse, eliciting little emotion — enough to get out all the facts, but not dwelling on tedious or terrible details. In speaking to the students who survived, he always starts off asking about their current schooling or job, a humanizing touch and, perhaps, a subtle reminder of the futures lost for the classmates who couldn’t testify.
The Broward Public Defender’s Office, which is representing Cruz, has also done zero cross-examination questioning on the majority of the state’s witnesses. Legal experts say the strategy makes sense — Cruz has already pleaded guilty, and there’s little to be gained by grilling traumatized former students and teachers.
Still, that’s allowed Satz to weave together a fast-moving but comprehensive narrative. A story of horrifying inhumanity.
“The defense hasn’t done anything but let Satz build a wall, and he’s done an amazing job building it brick by brick,” said Gail Levine, a retired Miami-Dade senior death-penalty prosecutor. “This jury is not bored. The state isn’t dragging it out.”
Still, Levine — whose flair for colorful opening and closing statements in Miami made her one of the county’s most successful homicide prosecutors — wouldn’t mind seeing a little more.
“I would like to see a little more emotion. I would like to see it humanized a little more. He’s trying to keep it nuts and bolts. I hope the jury understands that,” Levine said. “Everybody has their style and their style has to work for them. That’s how it’s worked effectively for him and people respect him for that.”
Of course, the focus of the trial will shift from Satz and his case for executing Cruz once the state finishes its case in a couple of weeks. Then, Cruz’s defense lawyers will present experts and witnesses who will talk about the mitigating circumstances behind mass murder. They’ll argue that the gunman’s brain and mental-health disorders, tumultuous upbringing and supposed victimization by bullies were contributing factors.
The hope: that at least one juror will be swayed. One no vote on execution will be enough to “save” Cruz — meaning send him to prison for the rest of his life.
A long history
A native of Philadelphia, Satz joined the Broward State Attorney’s Office after graduating from law school at the University of Miami. He rose to become the chief of the homicide unit, then ran for election when former top prosecutor Phil Shailer chose not to seek reelection.
Voters ushered him into office in November 1976. The Democrat was largely reelected without opposition over the decades.
Over the years, Satz’s office has been characterized as tough, if conservative. For many South Florida defense lawyers, that often led to criticism that his prosecutors were too inflexible when it came to plea deals and sentencing. Earlier in his tenure, Satz’s office was also criticized for not being aggressive enough on public corruption and that he was too soft on politicians.
Broward’s longtime and now-retired public defender, Howard Finkelstein, for years complained about Broward’s justice system sending people of color to jail or prison for minor offenses. “I am not inclined to speak on his tenure since 1976 as I have been writing letters to him, to editors of newspapers and the Department of Justice about the institutionalized racism apparent and obvious in Broward’s criminal justice system for decades,” he said when Satz announced he was not seeking reelection.
Supporters pointed out that Satz long embraced pretrial intervention programs for veterans and drug addicts and came to support civil citations for minor marijuana possession cases. In 2019, Satz also established a “conviction review unit,” and a year later reduced prison sentences for 24 people serving stiff sentences for trafficking in prescription drugs.
During his time in office, Satz kept a low public profile, rarely holding press conferences, but never hesitating to get involved prosecuting the most egregious of violent criminals.
Before Parkland, he led the case in the 2018 re-sentencing for Gerhard Hojan, who fatally shot two employees during a robbery at a Davie Waffle House in 2002. A jury sent Hojan to death row for the second time.
Veteran Broward defense lawyer H. Dohn Williams, who represented Hojan, recalled Satz’s preparation.
“He knew the exact number of pennies, dimes, nickels, etcetera, in the cash drawer that Mr. Hojan took,” said Williams, who worked alongside Satz when they were young prosecutors in the early 1970s. “When they say he’s got an incredible memory and eye for detail, that’s an understatement.”
Satz also spent 22 months in trial leading the prosecution against three men who murdered Broward Sheriff’s Deputy Brian Tephford in 2006. Jurors convicted all three men. All went to prison for life.
Williams also represented one of the defendants. “There were two guns involved,” he said. “Mr. Satz knew the serial numbers of those guns too.”
A complex case
That Satz would personally lead the team to prosecute Cruz was not a surprise — the day after the Feb. 14, 2018, shooting, he and his attorneys and investigators toured the 1200 building where the massacre took place.
“It is very unusual for the elected state attorney to try cases in large state prosecuting offices,” three of his chief assistant prosecutors, Chuck Morton, Jeff Marcus and Ralph Jackson Ray Jr., later wrote in a tribute published in the South Florida Sun Sentinel. “But Mike believed that it was his responsibility to take on the most severe cases in his office.”
Within days of his arrest on the day of the shooting, Cruz’s defense lawyers offered to have him plead guilty in exchange for a life prison sentence over death. Satz declined.
While never a whodunit, the trial was always going to be complex given the sheer scope of the tragedy. Prosecutors listed over 1,000 witnesses, the defense over 300, although most aren’t likely to testify.
A little more than a year later, in June 2019, Satz announced that he would not seek reelection.
“I feel it is important to announce my decision now so I can continue to focus on the Parkland case and give a qualified candidate enough time to put forth their campaign for office,” Satz said in a press release at the time.
Voters in November 2020 elected Harold Pryor to succeed Satz.
But Satz would not be retiring. In January 2021, the new state attorney hired back Satz and his former top deputy, Jeff Marcus, to work on the Parkland case. Each earn $100 an hour, maxed out at 133 hours per month, or a little over 33 hours per week.
The State Attorney’s Office consulted with Florida’s Justice Administrative Commission, which handles billing for court-appointed attorneys, and “determined this was the most cost-effective and fiscally conservative way to handle this case,” according to a spokeswoman.
Satz is joined by prosecutors Marcus, Carolyn McCann, Nicole Chiappone, Steven Klinger and executive legal assistant Aaron Savitski.
At an age when most people retire, this could well be Satz’s last case as a prosecutor. But as is his style, he’s kept that decision close to the vest and hasn’t said publicly.
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