Because the 12 jurors failed to agree that Holmes should be executed, he will be sentenced to life in prison without parole for the 2012 attack on a midnight screening of a Batman movie that left 70 injured.<\/p>\n
Nine jurors wanted to execute Holmes, but one was opposed and two others wavered, a juror said.<\/p>\n
\u201cMental illness played into the decision more than anything else,\u201d said the woman, who wouldn\u2019t give her name.<\/p>\n
The verdict shocked the courtroom. Holmes\u2019 mother, Arlene, who had begged for his life, leaned her head against her husband\u2019s shoulder and sobbed. Aurora police officers who responded to the scene of Holmes\u2019 attacks cried.<\/p>\n
Sandy Phillips, whose daughter Jessica Ghawi was killed by Holmes, shook her head no and then held it in her hands. Ashley Moser, whose 6-year-old daughter, Veronica Moser-Sullivan, died in the attack and who was herself paralyzed by Holmes\u2019 bullets, also shook her head and then leaned it against the wheelchair of victim Caleb Medley.<\/p>\n
Families began to leave the courtroom as Judge Carlos Samour Jr. continued reading the verdict. Their wails were audible through closed courtroom doors.<\/p>\n
Holmes, who is on medication that dulls his responses, showed no reaction. His attorneys left without commenting.<\/p>\n
The verdict was a setback for District Attorney George Brauchler, who two years ago rejected a plea deal from Holmes\u2019 attorney that would have ended the case with life in prison, the same result. Brauchler said the defense refused to let Holmes be examined by a state psychiatrist or release a notebook in which he detailed his reasons for the attack. Holmes\u2019 subsequent videotaped psychiatric exams were played at trial, and the notebook entered into evidence.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause of that decision,\u201d Brauchler said, \u201cthe community now knows everything about this case.\u201d He praised the jury for \u201ca hell of a job\u201d in the four-month trial.<\/p>\n
Defense attorneys argued Holmes\u2019 schizophrenia led to a psychotic breakdown, and powerful delusions drove him to carry out one of the nation\u2019s deadliest mass shootings.<\/p>\n
The verdict is the latest blow to the death penalty in Colorado, which has executed only one person since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the penalty in 1977. Gov. John Hickenlooper in 2013 said he would not carry out the scheduled execution of a man convicted of killing four at a Chuck E. Cheese in 1993.<\/p>\n
It took jurors about 12 hours of deliberations to decide the first part \u2013 they rejected his insanity defense and found him guilty of 165 felony counts.<\/p>\n
The defense then conceded his guilt but insisted during the sentencing phase that his crimes were caused by the psychotic breakdown of a mentally ill young man, reducing his moral culpability and making a life sentence appropriate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Because the 12 jurors failed to agree that Holmes should be executed, he will be sentenced to life in prison without parole for the 2012 attack on a midnight screening of a Batman movie that left 70 injured. Nine jurors wanted to execute Holmes, but one was opposed and two others wavered, a juror said. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":110380,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[4170,629],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-110379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-citizens-initiative-and-recall","tag-southern-ute-indian-tribe"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110379"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=110379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}