Judge defends Aurora shooting jurors as victim's mother denounces life sentence

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/aug/24/colorado-theater-shooting-judge-defends-life-sentence

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The judge who oversaw the trial of Colorado movie theater gunman James Holmes gave an impassioned defense of the jury and the trial itself on Monday after the mother of one of the wounded said Holmes’s life sentence showed more concern for the killer than for the victims.

“You can’t claim there was no justice because it wasn’t the outcome you expected,” judge Carlos A Samour Jr said in an unusual speech from the bench during Holmes’s formal sentencing hearing for the 2012 attack.

Samour said the jury was fair and impartial and that he tried his utmost to be the same.

“And that’s how you know it was justice,” he said.

Samour spoke after Kathleen Pourciau testified that her daughter, Bonnie Kate Pourciau, suffered constant, excruciating pain and terrible nightmares from the gunshot wounds she suffered at Holmes’s hand.

Kathleen Pourciau said the life sentence showed little respect for the value of life.

“The message is the state of Colorado values a mass murderer more than the lives of those he murdered,” she said, speaking from a lectern facing Samour and occasionally turning toward the attorneys and the packed gallery behind her.

Afterward, she sat quietly and nodded but showed no other reaction as Samour defended the trial.

Holmes killed 12 people and injured 70 more when he opened fire during a packed midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises. His attorneys blamed the massacre on his schizophrenia and psychotic delusions, and experts testified that it wouldn’t have happened if he were not seriously mentally ill.

Jurors quickly rejected his insanity defense, convicting him on 16 July of 165 felony counts. But they were divided on the sentence, with 11 favoring death and one favoring life in prison without parole. Under Colorado law, jurors must be unanimous to impose the death penalty, so Holmes automatically got life.

Samour will formally hand down the life sentences for 24 murder convictions – two for each victim – after a three-day hearing that began Monday. He will also sentence Holmes on the 141 other counts, which include attempted murder and an explosives charge.

The hearing will not change the life sentence but gives survivors a chance to share their harrowing stories.

At least 100 victims and witnesses are expected to testify. Holmes will also have an opportunity to speak, though he declined to do so during his trial.

Holmes wore a burgundy jail uniform and sat shackled at the defense table Monday. He showed little emotion as Pourciau and others described the physical pain, the grief and the despair his rampage caused.