Developing news: shooting at Colorado theater

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Fri Jul 20, 2012 6:48 am

Gunman in gas mask and bullet proof vest shoots up midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises. 14 dead 50 injured. May have used tear gas.

Suspect in custody no word on identity or motive yet.

G8RKyle · Post by **G8RKyle** » Fri Jul 20, 2012 9:14 am

Horrible news. I pray those families can find peace eventually. We need to have cruel and unusual punishments for people like this a-hole.

MinGator · Post by **MinGator** » Fri Jul 20, 2012 11:20 am

I know our justice system doesn't work this way, but a Slooooow and PAINFUL death sounds appropriate for this d-bag.

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Mon Jul 23, 2012 10:47 am

The guy is reportedly not cooperating with the police, which makes me wonder why he told them about the bomb in the first place. The girl who lived underneath him (named "Fonzi," funnily enough) almost set it off on the night of the shooting. He had rigged his stereo to play loud techno music and she almost opened his door when she went upstairs to tell him to knock it off.

TheTodd · Post by **TheTodd** » Mon Jul 23, 2012 11:39 am

I'm guessing he told them about it thinking they'd just walk right into his trap and he'd kill more people. If that is the case, they could probably tack on some more charges, although they won't need them.

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Mon Jul 23, 2012 1:42 pm

Maybe. I'll be real interested to see what they find on his computer.

a1bion · Post by **a1bion** » Mon Jul 23, 2012 2:07 pm

I've kind of avoided the news over the past few days, just because this is such an awful story. The level of planning that this guy did on this is just unbelievable. That fact alone would seem to preclude this guy from trying to claim insanity as a defense, wouldn't it? Chime in you lawyer types.

Oh, and I did see that TMZ found he posted a profile on Adult Friend Finder where he asked if women would visit him in prison. What a sick fuck.

G8RKyle · Post by **G8RKyle** » Mon Jul 23, 2012 2:57 pm

It's really hard to watch the news. I'm like you, I've just tuned out for the last few days. I never pay much attention over the weekends anyway, but this time it was easy to purposely avoid television.

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Mon Jul 23, 2012 2:58 pm

Foreknowledge doesn't necessarily preclude an insanity defense. I'm not sure what standard Colorado uses, but in general he's got to have no idea that what he was doing was wrong (e.g., he thought that the victims were inanimate objects and the movie theater was a shooting range) or that his mental illness was such that he thought he was justified (e.g., he thought he was killing the devil).

The insanity defense is really going to be his only option here, as they caught him pretty much red-handed, minutes (if not seconds) after the crime, with all the weapons, body armor and gas mask on.

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Tue Jul 24, 2012 8:45 am

Looked it up. Colorado follows the M'Naghten rule, with the irresistible impulse test. For those of you who didn't go to law school, the M'Naghten rule states that in order for the defendant to be found legally insane, he must have been "laboring under such a defect of reason, from disease of mind, as not to know the nature and quality of the act he was doing; or if he did know it, that he did not know he was doing what was wrong."

Due to some criticisms of M'Naghten, some states (including Colorado) have adopted the "irresistible impulse" test as a supplement to M'Naghten. Under this test, the defendant's mental illness must have been such that he could not control his impulse to commit a wrongful act. In Colorado, the state has the burden of proving that the defendant was legally sane at the time of the crime.

So, in order for the defense to prevail with an insanity defense, the state must be unable to show that (1) Holmes knew what he was doing was wrong; OR (2) he willingly committed a wrongful act.

Florida follows the M'Naghten rule, but not the irresistible impulse test.

In any event, insanity defenses rarely work. In the rare cases where they do, the defendant is usually committed to a high-security psychiatric institution, where his status is periodically evaluated. John Hinckley is a good example of this principal at work - he has been committed for 30 years, but he makes the news every year when he asks to be released to visit his family.

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Tue Jul 24, 2012 3:54 pm

And, almost comical in its predictability, the first lawsuit has been filed... by a guy who wasn't even shot.

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/31 ... etail.html

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Wed Jul 25, 2012 11:50 am

Let the conspiracy theories commence!

a1bion · Post by **a1bion** » Wed Jul 25, 2012 1:22 pm

^^So I did a Google image search of this guy's picture and one of the results I got back had this general argument to it:

"The shooting occured at the Century 16 Theater. Century is 100 years. 100 + 16 = 116. Turn that number upside down and it's 911."

No, I have no idea what any of that is supposed to mean.

a1bion · Post by **a1bion** » Wed Jul 25, 2012 1:38 pm

That being said, I do like how the guy's letter alternates ink colors and between all caps and normal caps at complete random moments. Shows the crazy is strong with that one.

DocZaius · Post by **DocZaius** » Wed Jul 25, 2012 1:45 pm

Speaking of crazy, Sideshow Bob apparently sent a notebook about his plans to some random psychiatrist ahead of time, but it sat in the mailroom at the University of Colorado until Monday.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/07/25/ex ... mailed-to/

TheTodd · Post by **TheTodd** » Wed Jul 25, 2012 3:24 pm

That's a crappy marine if he couldn't kill 12 unarmed people and injure 50+ more in a theater. It would literally be shooting fish in a barrel. And it wasn't anywhere near $20k in gear, maybe $3000. Plus Sideshow Bob is a genius and not some scrub in the marines that can't think for himself.