The Latest: Students motivated by shooting register to vote

PARKLAND, Fla. (AP) — The Latest on the deadly shooting at a Florida high school. (all times local):

4:50 p.m.

Florida’s governor has proclaimed Feb. 14 as Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Remembrance Day.

Gov. Rick Scott issued the proclamation Friday afternoon. Scott invited all Floridians to join him for a moment of silence at 3 p.m. Saturday, which is 17 days after 17 people died during the shooting in Parkland.

The Florida Senate is scheduled to hold a rare Saturday session to consider a bill addressing school safety and gun sales. The bill was scheduled to be heard Friday, but it was postponed so the Senate could keep working behind the scenes to reach an agreement with the House on bill language. Saturday’s session will allow questions on the bill, but a final Senate vote wouldn’t be held until Monday.

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About two dozen high school students registered to vote at a rally organized in response to the Florida high school massacre that left 17 people dead last month.

The 18- and 19-year-olds registered Friday in a Broward County park about 15 miles south of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. The event was organized by Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum.

American Heritage high school senior Harrison Arnberg said he registered because he wants the state to ban semi-automatic weapons like the one use in the Feb. 14 shooting. He says he believes he would have registered anyway, but the shooting made him more motivated.

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1:20 p.m.

A Florida police union is calling for more transparency in the investigations into the law enforcement response to a Feb. 14 mass shooting at a high school that killed 17 people.

In a Miami Herald report Friday, Broward Sheriff’s Office Deputies Association chief Jeff Bell said Sheriff Scott Israel should release all surveillance videos, audio recordings and dispatch logs documenting the response to the shooting.

Bell said deputies are being called “cowards” even if they weren’t involved in that response.

Israel has blasted a deputy working as the school’s resource officer for not entering the school building while 19-year-old former student Nikolas Cruz was shooting.

A dispatch log obtained by the Herald and Fox News show a sheriff’s office captain initially told deputies to form a perimeter instead of confronting the gunman.

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1:20 p.m.

Everytown for Gun Safety announced Friday that it would be providing $2.5 million in grants to communities holding marches to protest gun violence. Those marches are being held the same day as the March for Our Lives in Washington on March 24.

The movement was inspired by students who banded together after the shooting at a high school last month in Parkland, Florida, that killed 17 students and adults.

Everytown is providing 500 grants of $5,000 each to local community marches. The grants are to be used for such things as permits, signs, banners and transportation.

Everytown President John Feinblatt says students are making history and demanding that elected officials protect them.

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11:15 a.m.

Florida Senate President Joe Negron announced the chamber will hold a rare Saturday session to consider a bill addressing school safety and gun sales.

The bill was scheduled to be heard Friday, but it was postponed so the Senate could keep working behind the scenes to reach an agreement with the House on bill language. Saturday’s session will allow questions on the bill, but a final Senate vote wouldn’t be held until Monday.

The national debate over school safety and gun control has been reignited since the Feb. 14 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, killed 17 people.

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10:55 a.m.

A Florida sheriff says students or their families will be responsible for investigative costs after more threats were made about harming people at schools.

The Daytona Beach News-Journal reports that four Volusia County teenagers were arrested Thursday for alleged threats.

Law enforcement officials say a total of 19 such arrests have been made in the county since the Feb. 14 mass shooting that killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland. All are accused of making verbal or online threats about shooting, blowing up or doing physical harm to others at school.

Sheriff Mike Chitwood said the suspects arrested Thursday will owe at least $1,000 to cover costs. Three are in high school and one is in middle school. All were charged with making a threat to discharge a destructive device.

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10:45 a.m.

A sheriff’s office captain told deputies to form a perimeter instead of confronting the gunman at a Florida high school where 17 people were killed in a mass shooting.

That’s according to documents obtained by the Miami Herald.

The newspaper reported late Thursday that it had obtained a partial Broward Sheriff’s Office dispatch log. The log showed that Capt. Jan Jordan gave the order for deputies to establish a perimeter.

An earlier report on the call logs published by Fox News showed that the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School would have been over by the time Jordan gave her order.

The sheriff’s office and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement are investigating the actions of officers responding to the shooting.

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8:50 a.m.

A Florida city has erased the name of the man accused of killing 17 people at a high school from a playground fence.

The Sun Sentinel reports that Nikolas Cruz’s mother had gotten her sons involved in the building of the 7-acre (3-hectare) playground at Liberty Park in Parkland.

Inscriptions in items surrounding the playground were sold as a fundraiser when it opened in 2000. Cruz’s name and his brother’s name were engraved on wooden slats in the fence.

After the Feb. 14 massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, city spokesman Todd De Angelis said removing Cruz’s name “seemed the only logical course of action.” An inscription of his brother’s name remains on the fence.

Cruz faces 17 counts of first-degree murder.

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Follow the AP’s complete coverage of the Florida school shooting here: <a target=”&mdash;blank” href=”https://apnews.com/tag/Floridaschoolshooting”>https://apnews.com/tag/Floridaschoolshooting</a> .

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