Death penalty remains option for Colorado theater shooter James Holmes

James Holmes is still facing a possible death sentence for the movie theater shooting rampage in Colorado three years ago that killed 12 people.

With Monday’s ruling, which was handed down after just under three hours of deliberation over the course of two days, the jury determined that the mitigating factors laid out by the defense-including the gunman’s history of mental illness and the fact that he had no previous criminal record-did not outweigh the aggravating factors of his crime.

These mitigating factors do not justify or excuse the murders, Samour told the jury at the beginning of this trial phase, but they “might serve as a basis for a sentence less than death”.

According to the Daily Mail, the defense attorneys also “pleaded with jurors to show mercy, saying it was mental illness and not free will that drove Holmes to murder”.

After that, the jury will deliberate yet again to make its final decision whether to sentence Holmes to death or to life in prison with no parole.

“I’m a little overwhelmed, but at the same time my job is to share Jessie with the jury, and I will do that to the best of my ability”, she said outside the courthouse.

Nowlan, who described himself as very religious, says that he’s eager to get on with his life and that the victims will soon have the closure they deserve.

The same jury last month convicted Holmes of killing 12 people and injuring 70 in the July 2012 attack at a suburban Denver movie theater.

Sandy Phillips, whose daughter Jessica Ghawi was killed, said prosecutors advised her that she would testify Tuesday.

CENTENNIAL- Jurors have reached a decision on whether to keep the death penalty as an option for Aurora theater shooter James Holmes.

Holmes stood still and silent, his hands in the pockets of his khaki pants, as Judge Carlos A. Samour Jr. read the jury’s decision as it pertained to each of the 12 slain victims.

Among those who testified in a desperate bid to save his life was his younger sister who said, “I still love him”.

But legal experts said that there’s no way to predict that final decision. And how could they have found otherwise, given the magnitude of the slaughter?

This next stage can be more challenging for each juror, and to choose capital punishment, they must be unanimous, Denver defense attorney Dan Recht said.

Holmes was a promising student in a demanding neuroscience Ph.D. program at the University of Colorado when his life went awry.

Prosecutors, emphasizing the human toll and indiscriminate cruelty of opening fire on a crowd of moviegoers, argued that Holmes should join the three other men on Colorado’s death row.