Lawyers argue over Batman gunman

Two versions of the unstable mind of James Holmes were presented to a jury as lawyers revealed more about the gunman who opened fire on hundreds of moviegoers at a Batman premiere.

The lead prosecutor displayed an image of the cinema door on a TV screen as he told of a sinister but sane killer who methodically carried out the 2012 mass murder to make himself feel good and be remembered.

“Through this door is horror. Through this door are bullets, blood, brains and bodies. Through this door, one guy who thought as if he had lost his career, lost his love life, lost his purpose, came to execute a plan,” said District Attorney George Brauchler, standing before a scale model of the cinema.

“He tried to murder a theatre full of people to make himself feel better and because he thought it would increase his self-worth.”

Mr Brauchler said two previously secret court-ordered psychiatric exams found Holmes to be sane.

Public Defender Daniel King countered that Holmes suffers from schizophrenia, a diagnosis confirmed by 20 doctors.

Jurors must decide whether Holmes was able to know right from wrong when he slipped into the cinema, unleashed tear gas and killed 12 people and wounded 70.

He is charged with first-degree murder, attempted murder, an explosives offence and committing an act of violence for the mayhem he caused on July 20, 2012.

Holmes has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. His defence hopes jurors will agree and have him indefinitely committed to a mental institution. Under Colorado law, prosecutors must prove Holmes was sane in order to have him executed or spend the rest of his life in prison.

“Mental illness can sure sound like an excuse, but in this case, it’s not,” Mr King said. “There will be no doubt in your minds that by the end of this trial, Mr. Holmes is severely mentally ill.”

Katie Medley was nine months pregnant, so she picked a seat near the exit door, just in case she went into labour when her husband and a friend took her to see the Batman premiere nearly three years ago.

She saw the man in combat gear slip through the door and toss a can through the air, filling the cinema with tear gas as he fired at the audience. She dropped to the floor, squeezing with her belly between the chairs, and could not understand why her husband was still sitting upright.

Then she saw he had been shot through the eye, his face was gushing blood. She had to decide: stay with him, or flee in hope of saving their unborn son?

Ms Medley, the first witness called as evidence began in the death penalty trial of James Holmes, said she took the hand of her husband and felt him squeeze hers back.

“I told him that I loved him and that I would take care of our baby if he didn’t make it,” said Ms Medley, who gave birth to a healthy son, now three, as her husband Caleb underwent brain surgery in the same hospital.

Caleb Medley, an aspiring comedian, survived with terrible injuries. His speech is barely intelligible, and he was pushed to the witness stand in a wheelchair. He answered questions today by pointing to letters on a poster board for a court interpreter.

Defence lawyers said Holmes has “essentially admitted” killing 12 people and injuring 70 more, so there’s no reason to make survivors relive their horror in the courtroom for months on end.

Instead, they want to focus on what was going on inside his mind, which they say was so addled by schizophrenia that his sense of right and wrong was distorted, and he lost control over his actions.

Perhaps signalling a strategy they will use with many other victims whose lives were turned inside out by the shooting, the defence had no questions for the Medleys.

Holmes, who is being harnessed to the floor by a cable under his clothes, sat quietly. His parents, Robert and Arlene, showed no reaction from their seats in the second row.

The trial’s opening statements yesterday revealed many details about Holmes’ life before, during and after the shootings that had remained shrouded in mystery due to the judge’s gag order.

Defence lawyers portrayed him as a “good kid” who enjoyed surfing with his family and never got in trouble, but who also sensed something wrong with his mind, even at a young age.

He hoped studying neuroscience at the University of Colorado would help him fix his thoughts, but “psychosis bloomed” instead and delusions commanded him to kill as many people as he could, they said.

District attorney George Brauchler depicted a frighteningly smart killer who meticulously planned and carried out the mass murder to make himself feel good and be remembered, while knowing that it was immoral and illegal.

He also revealed that two court-appointed psychiatrists concluded that Holmes was sane when he opened fire, chasing moviegoers up and down the aisles of the Aurora, Colorado cinema and shooting at people who tried to flee.

Public defender Daniel King countered that Holmes was psychotic at the time, and that every doctor who has seen him – 20 in all – agreed he suffers from schizophrenia.

Holmes has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. His defence hopes jurors will agree and have him indefinitely committed to a mental institution.

Prosecutors say he was sane and should be executed.