It wasn't what his lawyers wanted, but it was better than nothing. Up in Colorado Judge, Carlos Samour accepted an insanity plea by James Holmes. Holmes, of course, is accused of multiple counts of murder, attempted murder, and just about anything else prosecutors could come up with in connection with the mass shooting at a theater in Aurora, Colorado last summer.
Earlier his defense team had offered to enter a guilty plea in attempt to get the death penalty off the table, but the state was having none of it. Now they've had to settle for a defense they claim is so restrictive that the Colorado law defining it is unconstitutional. According to an AP report written by, Dan Elliott the judge rejected the argument last week.
The insanity plea means that Holmes now has to undergo a lengthy mental evaluation by state doctors. The same law says if Holmes doesn't cooperate with the doctors during the evaluation and he is convicted, he can lose his right to call expert witnesses who would testify about his sanity, or lack thereof, during the penalty phase of the trial. The defense has pointed out, to no avail, the law doesn't define what cooperation is. It appears when your client is spectacularly guilty of a crime so gruesome that the prosecutor won't even accept a guilty plea, you're arguments really are reduced to the minutiae of the language.
The judge also ruled the defense has to turn over the infamous notebook, or journal which was sent to, Dr. Lynne Fenton, the University of Colorado, Denver psychiatrist who had been treating Holmes.
Fenton claims she contacted campus police in June of last year and told them, Holmes had homicidal thoughts and was a danger to the public. She also said she told them, Holmes had threatened her and intimidated her.
Campus police claim they never talked to Holmes, even though Officer Lynn Whitten confirms she spoke with Fenton about him. Whitten went so far as to say Fenton had told her Holmes had texted her threatening messages after she had stopped seeing him.
Holmes sent Fenton a package post marked July 12 of last year, which was eight days before he opened fire. It was found sitting in a University of Colorado mail room four days after the attack. Media reports say the package contained what appeared to be a journal, some burnt twenty dollar bills, and a "post it" type piece of paper with the infinity sign drawn on it.
Earlier reports have hinted that Holmes was able to fall through the cracks because by the time Fenton reported him to campus authorities he had dropped out of school. Since he was no longer a student he was no longer the problem of U of C cops. No one thought to tell Aurora police, or anyone else about the guy, so he was able to continue buying ammunition, weapons, and materials that would allow him to amass a deadly arsenal and construct explosive devices completely unobstructed.
After the shooting and all the bombs, booby traps, and trip wires were dismantled in Holmes' apartment police found, among other things, 50 cans and bottles of beer and meds used to treat anxiety and depression.
If the jury finds Holmes not guilty by reason of insanity, Elliott writes he would be chucked away into a state mental facility for an indefinite period of time. However, as unlikely as it might seem, he could at some point down the road be judged cured, or returned to sanity and released.
Right.
Well, stranger things have happened. John Hinckley, the guy who shot Ron Reagan, gets to roam around Virginia every now and then for days at time. In fact there are brigades of doctors who claim he is no longer a threat to anyone.
However, one has to think there isn't a jury in the world out there right now who will find Jimmy Holmes innocent because he is a little funny in the head. Especially when they realize there is a sliver of a chance he could stroll out of the front gates of an institution in a few decades as a free man.
So now the waiting begins for the wounded and the relatives of those who were killed in that theater in Aurora. I've never been a big on the term "closure." There is no closure when someone you love goes to see a movie and gets shot multiple times by a lunatic just because he can.This tragedy is an open wound and it will continue to fester for lifetimes.
The world moves on, but many will be stuck in time until James Holmes either goes away for the rest of his life, or takes the needle. Unfortunately that is simply the way it is. In the end it is part of what makes us human.
sic vita est.
6-4-13
No comments:
Post a Comment