Holmes, 24 charges for the massacre
The young man risks the death penalty

NEW YORK – 24 counts of first-degree murder and 116 charges for attempted murder. These are the formal accusations made against James Holmes for the massacre in Aurora’s cinema. Today, the red-haired killer, who on July 20 had shot the crowd gathered at the Denver, Colorado, cinema madly for  , killing 12 and wounding 58, returned to the Centennial court to be formally indicted. Against him 12 counts of premeditated murder, as many for murder carried out with extreme indifference and 116 for attempted murder, one for each survivor of the massacre. For a total of 142 heads of indictment. Risk of death.

The defense of the killer will support mental illness to escape the death penalty that does not apply to minors and mentally ill people in Colorado, while the prosecution instead claims the full capacity to understand and to want of the murderer and the premeditation of his crazy gesture. The prosecution has anticipated that it will take several weeks before formalizing a possible request for capital punishment, but in the 40 pages of the indictment has made every effort to ensure that it is punished with the utmost severity.

The decision to request the attempted murder for each of the 116-surviving people in the room is due to the fact that indiscriminately firing Holmes has endangered everyone’s lives. To these charges and to those for premeditated murder and murder with extreme indifference of 12 people are added two other leaders that bring the total to 142: that for possession of explosive device and that for the aggravating circumstance of “crime of violence”.

Unlike his first appearance in the classroom in which he appeared completely confused, perhaps because he was sedated, this time Holmes, a neurological science student, was more present and answered “yes” to a question from Judge William Sylvester.

(30 July 2012)