Post date: Jan 11, 2013 9:56:33 PM
The lawyers for accused Colorado movie theater gunman, James Holmes, ask for more time to prepare a plea for the charges that he shot 12 people to death and wounded dozens more.
CENTENNIAL, COLORADO, UNITED STATES (JANUARY 11, 2013)(NBC) - The accused movie theater gunman, James Holmes, made an appearance in court on Friday (January 11), but his lawyers asked for more time to prepare a plea to charges of killing 12 people and wounding dozens of others.
As expected, a Colorado state court judge granted a defense request to postpone arraignment for the 25-year-old former neuroscience doctoral student to give his legal team more time to study the voluminous evidence and testimony presented by prosecutors in a preliminary hearing earlier this week.The arraignment, where Holmes' lawyers will enter a plea, is now set for March 12.
At the end of Friday's brief proceedings, the father of one of the victims in the shooting, shouted out "rot in hell, Holmes." There was no visible reaction by Holmes, who was being led out of the courtroom.
On Thursday (January 10), the judge ruled that prosecutors had succeeded in establishing probable cause to believe that Holmes, described by his own lawyers as suffering from an unspecified mental illness, committed the crimes alleged against him and ordered that he remain held without bail to stand trial.
Holmes is charged with multiple counts of first-degree murder and attempted murder, stemming from the July 20 rampage at a midnight screening of the Batman film "The Dark Knight Rises" in the Denver suburb of Aurora.
In addition to the 12 people who died, 58 others were wounded and a dozen more suffered additional injuries.