Jorge Varona Suarez<\/a>, 38, fired at Cross, hitting him in the arm. The bullet traveled through his chest and landed next to his heart.<\/p>\n\u201cOne centimeter to the left, I would\u2019ve been dead, one centimeter to the right, I would\u2019ve been paralyzed,\u201d Cross said from the witness stand.<\/p>\n
Cross testified that Varona then stood over him and shot him a second time.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen I felt a presence stood over me. He shot me, a face shot, and when he shot me, the bullet missed my head but went through; it split my lip and knocked my tooth out,\u201d Cross said. \u201cAnd the lip produced so much blood he thought he had a head shot, and I played dead, and I just laid there.”<\/p>\n
Varona is on trial for murder and attempted murder. He is claiming self-defense.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When defense attorneys questioned Cross, things got heated in the courtroom. They alleged Cross mouthed a message to Varona across the room during a break in his testimony.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou were mouthing things to him, correct?\u201d asked defense attorney Emma Wilkes asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cI said one thing. You want to know what I said?\u201d Cross said. \u201cI said, \u2018I\u2019ll see you next lifetime.\u2019 I said, \u2018I will see you next lifetime.’\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd you told him, ‘I\u2019m going to kill you?\u201d Wilkes asked.<\/p>\n
\u201c’I will see you next’ \u2013 stop it \u2013 \u2018I\u2019ll see you next lifetime.\u2019 That\u2019s what I said,\u201d Cross insisted.<\/p>\n
Defense attorneys claim Varona came into contact with Noel that night at the club because Noel was arguing with another patron. They say he fired his gun to protect others.<\/p>\n
But Cross told jurors there was no threat.<\/p>\n
\u201cDid you threaten him (Varona) in any way?” Assistant State Prosecutor Tonya Johnson asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d Cross replied.<\/p>\n
\u201cDid the victim threaten him in any way?\u201d Johnson asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d Cross replied.<\/p>\n
Varona is expected to testify in his own defense during trial. If convicted on the murder charge, he could face life in prison.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just looking at Torie Cross, you wouldn\u2019t know he was shot in the face two years ago. Cross…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":295132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[249,251,250,2033],"class_list":["post-295131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-only-on-6"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=295131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/295132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=295131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=295131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=295131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}