Batman Shooter James Holmes Found Guilty Over Cinema Massacre

James Holmes, the man who slipped into a darkened midnight premiere of the Batman movie The Dark Knight Rises in Colorado and opened fire, killing 12, has been found guilty of murder.

The jury made its decision on Thursday after deliberating for a day and a half.

Holmes, 27, had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity in the 2012 shootings that also wounded 70 people.

The verdict comes nearly three years to the day of the shootings. His attorneys argued that he was in the grips of a psychotic episode.

Jurors heard nearly three months of testimony, including heartbreaking and sometimes gruesome stories from more than 70 survivors who took the stand.

The trial will now enter a sentencing phase in which the jurors will hear testimony and decide whether he should be sent to prison for life without the possibility of parole or sentenced to death.

If they find him not guilty by reason of insanity, he would be committed indefinitely to a state mental hospital.

Prosecutors focused on the findings of two state-appointed forensic psychiatrists who examined Holmes months and years after the shooting and found him severely mentally ill yet capable of knowing right from wrong and therefore legally sane under Colorado law.

Dozens of investigators testified about the carnage Holmes inflicted and how he rigged his apartment into an elaborate booby trap he hoped would explode and divert first responders from the Aurora theater as he set about the July 20, 2012 attack.

Prosecutors honed in on Holmes' elaborate planning of the massacre. They showed jurors a spiral notebook in which Holmes listed what weapons to buy, which auditoriums in the theater complex would allow for the most casualties, and even an estimated emergency response time to the theater.

Defence attorneys portrayed Holmes as a struggling neuroscience graduate student so addled by mental illness that he was unable to tell right from wrong at the time of the shootings.

They said he suffered schizophrenia, and they called two doctors who said Holmes was in the grips of a psychotic episode when he acted on delusions that propelled him to kill. They called a far shorter list of witnesses, such as doctors and jail guards, who described Holmes' bizarre behavior before and after the attack.

Story: NZHerald