- Parents of the Parkland shooting victims shared stories about who their children could have become.
- As they testified at the shooter's sentencing hearing, the defense team was moved to tears.
- Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer's voice broke while giving directions to the court after testimony.
As parents of the children slain in the Parkland shooting took the witness stand during the shooter's sentencing hearing Tuesday, the gunman's defense team was moved to tears by testimony.
The father of Alyssa Alhadeff — who would have been entering her sophomore year of college this month had she not been murdered — gave emotional testimony about who his daughter could have been at Tuesday's hearing.
"Soon she'd go on to be a professional soccer player. She'd get her law degree, and maybe become one of the most successful business negotiation lawyers the world would see," Ilan Alhadeff said, according to CNN.
"She was supposed to get married, and I was going to have my father-daughter dance," he said, CNN reported. "She would have had a beautiful family, four kids, live in a gorgeous house – a beach house on the side.
"All those plans came to an end with Alyssa's murder," he said in court, according to CNN.
Some other parents of the 14 children murdered by the gunman also took the stand, sharing statements about their kids' potential futures and the impact their deaths have had.
One mother wondered if her son, the captain of the swim team, would have made it to the Olympics, and a father discussed navigating the world now as a family of four instead of a family of five, according to CNN.
As the parents shared their statements over the last two days of testimony, the shooter showed little emotion, CBS News reported.
But several of his own attorneys wiped away tears while listening to the parents' stories, CBS News reported. Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer's voice broke while giving directions to the court.
The shooter pleaded guilty in October to 17 counts of murder and 17 counts of attempted murder for opening fire on Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High school on February 14, 2018.
This phase of the ongoing trial is set to determine the shooter's sentence. The prosecution has argued for a death sentence while defense attorneys are fighting for life in prison without parole.
