On Friday, USA Today publicized that James Holmes received a castigation of life in prison without parole instead of the greatly warranted death penalty. He killed twelve people and injured 70 others. Holmes’ parents, Robert and Arlene, attended each day of their son’s trial.
Advertisement
For Holmes to be sentenced to death, every juror would have had to agree to the punishment.
She suspects that the dissenting juror didn’t want to sentence Holmes to death because of the possibility he suffers from mental illness, despite the fact that his insanity plea was overturned. It’s a devastating result no matter what.
“I don’t have the verbal skills adequately to convey my appreciation from every single person that was involved in bringing this trial to an end”, Tom Sullivan said.
The jury of nine women and three men could not reach a unanimous verdict on each murder count.
Although he respected the outcome, the district attorney who pursued the death penalty against Holmes said, “I still think death is justice for what that guy did but the system said otherwise”. They say he he listened to loud music through headphones when he shot into the audience to block out the screams of the victims.
Prosecutors pushed that Holmes had planned to attack more than 400 in the theatre shooting but due to the jamming of the drum magazine he bought to boost his firepower, he failed to proceed with his plan. Brauchler said he did so because the defense refused to let Holmes be examined by a state psychiatrist and produce the notebook in which he explained the attack.
Outside the courthouse, Brauchler said he was disappointed in the decision and still believed that death was the appropriate sentence.
Defense attorneys argued Holmes’ schizophrenia led to a psychotic break, and powerful delusions drove him to carry out one of the nation’s deadliest mass shootings.
A breakdown of the jury vote has not been released. “He is living, he is breathing and our loved ones are gone, for over three years now, and the gaping void and gaping wound that we have with the loss of our granddaughter has been replaced with the new abscess of him living”. Jurors also previously moved closer to the death penalty when they quickly determined the heinousness of Holmes’ crimes outweighed his mental illness.
It’s unclear why the juror decided to spare Holmes’ life.
Sandy Phillips, whose daughter Jessica Ghawi was murdered by Holmes, commiserated outside the courtroom after the verdict with a wheelchair-bound survivor, Caleb Medley.
“There will never be closure for these families, for these victims”, he said. The official sentencing hearing has been scheduled for August. 24 and is expected to last three days.
Juror 17 said some of the images shown during the months long trial will be hard to forget.
The jurors returned the sentence Friday.
The prosecution argued in favor of the death penalty, pointing to the number of casualties and the documented planning behind the lethal 2012 attack.
The death penalty was purposed for convicts who commit monstrous crimes, as did James Holmes.
This article was originally published at 1:15 p.m.
Attorneys for Holmes file an objection to the judge’s ruling that their client must be restrained during the trial, by means of hidden harness anchored to the floor.
But Judge Carlos Samour, Jr. allowed it and said jurors would only have 50 minutes to watch the tape. He also gave them a warning not to let the evidence prejudice their deliberations.
In the shooting, Holmes bought a ticket to see the Batman movie 12 days prior to the assault.
Advertisement
With regard to the deliberation process, juror 17 said the members of the jury were all open and respectful.
