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James Holmes - Aurora, CO "Theater Shooter"           

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James Holmes faces 166 counts, including murder and attempted murder charges in a mass shooting incident on July 20, 2012 inside an Aurora, CO movie theater.  He set off tear gas canisters and fired into the crowd repeatedly with multiple weapons.  He was apprehended without resistance near his car outside the theater.

 

Prosecutors say the 24-year-old neuroscience graduate student told a classmate he wanted to kill people. He also threatened his psychiatrist, and began massing an arsenal of weapons, including thousands of bullets and enough chemicals to rig his apartment into a potentially deadly booby trap.

 

Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. Holmes pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. His trial began April 27, 2015.

 

Click here for Timeline

Trial Schedule

The Case

The Victims (killed)

Who is James Holmes?

Born: December 13, 1987 in San Diego, Ca. 

 

Parents: His mother, Arlene, has been licensed as a registered nurse for more than 30 years. His father, Robert, is a mathematician who develops statistical models for financial services, specifically looking at fraud.

 

High School: Holmes graduated in 2006 from Westview High School in San Diego. One of Holmes' high school classmates, Breanna Hath, said he had a small group of friends who played video games and were “a little nerdy. He was really shy, really quiet, but really nice and sweet.”

 

Post-High School Internship: During the summer of 2006 he was an intern at a prestigious computer laboratory at the Salk Institute at UC San Diego.  In this video, Holmes can be seen making a presentation on "temporal illusion," which he defines as "an illusion that allows you to change the past" and that which "takes place inside the mind, as opposed to the external world." 

 

College: Holmes went on from high school to graduate with honors from the University of California, Riverside, with a degree in neuroscience in 2010. A college classmate remembered him as an "impressive" student. 

 

Graduate School: Holmes moved out of state and enrolled in a neurosciences graduate program at the University of Colorado Denver in 2011.  But something changed in the recent weeks leading up to the killings.  In early June 2012 he failed an oral exam and was in the process of withdrawing from the school. 

 

The Jury

The jury for the Holmes trial is comprised of 19 women and 5 men.  That means there are enough for a standard 12-member jury panel with 12 alternates, should replacement of any member be necessary.  The jurors are listed by seat number, from 1 to 24.  Click on juror image to read entire comments on each juror.

Note: 58 others were injured in the attack and thankfully survived.

Karen Pearson

Karen Pearson

Karen Pearson is the Chief Deputy District Attorney for the 18th Judicial District Attorney’s office. She has handled a wide range of cases, including homicides, child abuse resulting in death, sex assaults on children and aggravated robberies. Pearson volunteers on the Denver Bar Association's Peer Professionalism Assistance panel that advises lawyers on strategies for dealing with "rude and unprofessional" lawyers.

DA George Brauchler

DA George Brauchler

Took office in January 2013, after the shooting. He is also a Lt. Col. in the US Army Reserve's Regional Defense Counsel and an Adjunct Professor at DU's Sturm College of Law since 2002. He has a BS and JD from the University of Colorado. According to his DU biography, "he has 18 years of experience in the courtroom and has taken over 140 trials to verdict in state, federal, and military courts, the vast majority of which have been as a Prosecutor on behalf of Colorado and the U.S.

Jacob Edson

Jacob Edson

At the start of this year, he became a Chief Deputy District Attorney in the 18th Judicial District. Previously, he was a senior deputy DA and a deputy DA, first joining the office in 2002. He also taught as adjunct faculty at Arapahoe Community College. He has a Masters of Criminal Justice from the CU-Denver, a law degree from DU, an MBA from CSU and a BS in psychology from CSU.

Lisa Teesch-Maguire

Lisa Teesch-Maguire

Listed on LinkedIn as a Staff Attorney at the Rocky Mountain Victim Law Center (A nonprofit organization) since 2011, she has past experience as an ADA in the 18th Judicial District and with a private firm. She is a Graduate of both CU-Boulder's Leeds School of Business and School of Law.

Richard Orman

Richard Orman

Senior Deputy District Attorney for the 18th Judicial District since 2001. Previously, he worked for the Garfield County District Attorney’s office. He is an environmental science graduate of CU-Boulder and earned a JD at Georgetown. He grew up in Aspen, and graduated from Aspen High School.

Daniel King

Daniel King

A graduate of Boston College and the University of Denver's Sturm College of Law, King has been with the Public Defender's Office since 1995. His official title is the Chief Trial Deputy at Colorado State Public Defender. King has previous experience in death penalty cases, having represented Sir Mario Owens in that double murder trial.

Tamara Brady

Tamara Brady

Brady is on the faculty of the National College of Capital Voir Dire. She is a Chief Deputy Public Defender, Brady has experience with death penalty cases and mental illness cases. She represented Jose Luis Rubi-Nava in his trial for dragging his girlfriend to death behind a car. The defense originally sought to have Rubi-Nava declared mentally disabled, but they took a plea deal when the judge ruled against them.

Katherine Spengler

Katherine Spengler

Spengler graduated from CU Law in 2002. She is adjunct faculty at CU Law teaching trial advocacy and has also lectured about opening statements, but is not teaching this semester. In 2013, she defended Austin Sigg, who was sentenced to life in prison for the murder and dismemberment of Jessica Ridgeway.

The Players

The Prosecution

The Defense

The Judge

The man who abruptly was handed the reins of one of the most notorious criminal cases in Colorado history has been a prosecutor, an attorney with a huge private firm and an immigrant who stepped into his teenage years in a new country where he had to learn a new language.

 

Carlos A. Samour, Jr., has heard some notable and newsworthy cases in his six years on the bench in the 18th Judicial District in Arapahoe County. Samour is now overseeing the case against accused Aurora theater shooting suspect James Holmes.

 

Samour was appointed Monday to take over the Holmes case from William Sylvester, who reassigned himself moments after District Attorney George Brauchler announced he would seek the death penalty.

Click the thumbnail images at the bottom to bring up a larger profile of the subject.  Hover your mouse over the larger image to reveal text details.

Holmes Victim Anchor
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