SANTA ANA – “I’m very, very sorry,” admitted mass-murderer Scott Dekraai told a victim’s sister during a court hearing Thursday – the first time he has publicly shown any sign of remorse for carrying out a shooting at a Seal Beach salon that left eight dead.

Bethany Webb, sister of Laura Webb Elody, one of eight people killed by Scott Dekraai at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011, gestures toward Dekraai as she gives a statement to the court during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Paul Wilson, husband of Christy Wilson, one of eight people killed by Scott Dekraai at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011 wipes his eyes after he gives a statement to the court during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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Bethany Webb, sister of Laura Webb Elody, one of eight people killed by Scott Dekraai at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011 gives a statement to the court during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Orange County Sheriff’s deputy Lt. Martin Ramirez invoked his fifth amendment rights until granted immunity during a hearing in the Scott Dekraai trial in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Paul Wilson, husband of Christy Wilson, one of eight people killed by Scott Dekraai at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011 gives a statement to the court during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)



Confessed mass murderer Scott Dekraai listens to Bethany Webb, sister of Laura Webb Elody who was killed at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011 as she gives a statement to the court during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Scott Dekraai wipes his eyes after a statement by Bethany Webb, sister of Laura Webb Elody, one of eight people killed by Dekraai at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011, during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Bethany Webb, sister of Laura Webb Elody, one of eight people killed by Scott Dekraai at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011, stares at Dekraai as she gives a statement to the court during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Bethany Webb, sister of Laura Webb Elody, one of eight people killed by Scott Dekraai at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011, gestures her frustration as she gives a statement to the court during a hearing in Santa Ana on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Confessed mass murderer Scott Dekraai says “I’m sorry. I’m sorry” to Bethany Webb as she speaks during a hearing in Santa Ana, CA on Thursday, June 15, 2017. (Photo by Sam Gangwer, Orange County Register/SCNG)



Moments after the sister criticized him for referring to victims he shot as “collateral damage” during police interviews, Dekraai, shackled and sitting next to his attorney, said out loud to the court:

“I’m sorry. I’m very, very sorry.”

Judge Thomas M. Goethals quickly told Dekraai that it wasn’t the appropriate time for him to speak. Dekraai’s brief statement appeared to take family members of the victims by surprise.

“You can’t give me back what you took,” Bethany Webb, whose sister Laura Webb Elody died in the shooting, told Dekraai. “I’m sorry, you can’t apologize for this. …

“We sit here knowing that good, decent human beings were stolen. You will never give me back what was stolen from me.”

Dekraai has pleaded guilty to killing eight people and injuring a ninth during a shooting at a Seal Beach salon in 2011. The decision over whether he should spend the rest of his life in prison or face the death penalty has been continually delayed because of allegations of misuse of jailhouse informants.

Thursday’s hearing was part of an effort by Judge Goethals to determine if informant-related documents were illegally destroyed by the Sheriff’s Department. If so, Goethals has indicated that he could consider taking the death penalty off of the table.

The Orange County grand jury earlier this week released a report declaring that there was no sanctioned informant program in Orange County jails. The report, “The Myth of the Orange County Jailhouse Informant Program,” cited misuses of informants but determined that they weren’t sanctioned by key law enforcement officials.

Assistant Public Defender Scott Sanders, Dekraai’s attorney whose questioning of the use of jailhouse informants sparked the grand jury investigation as well as ongoing probes by the California Attorney General’s Office and the U.S. Department of Justice, has said that the grand jury members did not dig deep enough.

Paul Wilson, whose wife Christy Lynn Wilson was among those killed by Dekraai, sharply criticized the grand jury, saying the panel had “let every family member of the Seal Beach massacre down.”

“A myth? What a slap in the face to each of these families,” Wilson said as he read a hand-written statement to the court. “We have had to suffer through this, and they call it a myth.”

Wilson urged Goethals to have Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas take the stand. Goethals has already removed the Orange County District Attorney’s Office from the Dekraai case over questions about jailhouse informants and omissions in testimony from local sheriff deputies.

Rackauckas, after the release of the grand jury report, said that it debunked what he referred to as “phony news” regarding the use of informants.

Wilson noted that both his and Christy’s fathers are suffering from stage 4 cancer.

“It is awful and pathetic to know they may not live to see the coward that took Christy’s life brought to justice,” Wilson told Goethals.

Dekraai watched the family members as they spoke, but glanced away and stared downward when Wilson called him a coward.

Other family members of the victims told Goethals that they just want the Dekraai hearings to come to an end.

Nicholas Webb, Laura Webb Elody’s nephew, noted that he was 13 when the shooting occurred, so more than a quarter of his life has been spent waiting for closure.

“We are not getting anywhere,” Webb said. “I don’t want to spend the rest of my life having to hear and deal with this every single day because of what he took from us. We know what he did.”

The Dekraai hearing continues on Thursday afternoon.