The parents of journalist Steven Sotloff — who ISIS militants say will be the next American hostage to die — are emotionally wrecked with worry, a close friend said Thursday.
“I talked to Steve’s dad Tuesday night,” Emerson Lotzia, one of Sotloff’s roommates at the University of Central Florida, told the Miami Herald.
“He was in the best of spirits, then he was in the worst of spirits, he told me. ‘At last I know my son is alive,’ he said. ‘But look at the situation.’ It’s killing him, and he’s trying his best to stay on an even keel.”
Sotloff’s mother, Shirley, briefly spoke about her son for the first time Thursday.
“He’s still alive, so there’s really nothing to say,” she told reporters outside her South Florida home.