2017
Craig Appel & Matthew Ingui
Denver, CO
On July 20, 2012, James Holmes entered a Century 16 movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, during a midnight screening of the film The Dark Knight Rises. Dressed in tactical clothing, he shot into the audience with multiple firearms, killing 12 people and injuring 70 others. Holmes was arrested in his car parked outside the cinema minutes later. Prior to the shooting, Holmes rigged his apartment with homemade explosives, which were defused by a bomb squad one day after the shooting. Holmes confessed to the shooting but pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. Arapahoe County prosecutors sought the death penalty for Holmes in a trial beginning on April 27, 2015. He was convicted of twenty-four counts of first-degree murder, 140 counts of attempted first-degree murder, and one count of possessing explosives on July 16, 2015. He was given 12 life sentences, one for every person he killed, and 3,318 years for the attempted murders of those he wounded, and for rigging his apartment with explosives. The Century 16 Mass Murders Investigation presentation will cover the efforts taken to bring one of the most prolific mass murderers to justice. Topics being covered include a time line of the Defendant’s life leading up to the inception of the crime, arrest, laborious investigation, court proceedings, prosecution, post-conviction, and the legal gamesmanship, numerous obstacles overcome, lessons learned and tragedies averted. The goal of the presentation is to assist attendees in asking the difficult questions of how well they are prepared to deal with such an event investigatively, and where they stand in the knowledge and abilities with the resources they have at their disposal, so that when they are faced with a mass killing incident they will be better equipped to address it successfully.