Colorado jury asked about Louisiana movie attack

The jury also heard how Holmes read to his sister when she was a baby, tried to feed her, and wrote her a note saying how much he looked forward to playing with her.

Metzner, who diagnosed Holmes with schizoaffective disorder, said he did not think Holmes went on his rampage to get notoriety or because of his longstanding hatred of mankind, which he described in a spiral notebook. “If he was frustrated, he would just cool off and leave”.

Chris Holmes’ testimony on behalf of her brother came during the closing days for the defense’s case in his sentencing trial. They say he was suffering from a severe psychotic break at the time of the attack.

Chris Holmes testified Monday that he responded to questions with one-word answers during the visit almost two years after the attack.

“His eyes seemed a lot different”, she said, later noting that his eyes seemed to bulge out of his head.

Chris Holmes, 22, said her brother was kind and had a knack for playing with small children.

Defence attorneys are now calling witnesses in hopes they can prove mitigating factors outweigh the aggravating ones.

Family dinners were promptly at 5:30 p.m.as their parents, Robert and Arlene Holmes, “wanted a really strong family”. The defense said they expect to wrap this phase Wednesday.

“I still love him”, Holmes said. “It may increase your capacity to make bad choices”, Metzner testified Monday.

On the stand Monday, Metzner said Holmes’ actions were “directly related” to his delusions that killing people would increase his self-worth.

For the most part, Holmes and her brother got along pretty well “until I got too annoying”, she told jurors.

Twelve jurors said they had seen or heard about Thursday’s shooting through news reports or from friends or family but said they quickly turned away or ended those conversations.

The defense had asked for one female juror to be dismissed after she said she clicked on an online story about the Louisiana case, and briefly mentioned it to her husband. “It was very important to them to know what was going on in our lives”, she said.

Prosecutors and the defense will continue to make their case to the jury through the remainder of the trial’s sentencing portion, expected to last about a month.

The judge in the trial of Colorado theater gunman James Holmes is questioning jurors about whether last week’s deadly shooting at a Louisiana theater might influence them.

Judge Carlos A. Samour Jr. determined they had learned little about the shooting Thursday that killed two and wounded nine others and could still be impartial.

Jurors saw the siblings smiling together in family vacation photos as Chris Holmes described their unremarkable childhood. Jurors unanimously decided the death penalty can be considered for Holmes and will move on to the next phase of sentencing.

The same jurors who are deciding Holmes’ fate earlier convicted him of killing 12 people and injuring 70 in the July 2012 attack in Colorado.