Mass Murder At Colorado Movie Theater

Today started like so many other days.  I rolled out of bed at 7:17 and jumped on the scale.  I was pleased to see that my weight had dropped to 127.2.  Guess it was all the housework I did yesterday. 

I headed over to the fridge to get my morning dose of caffeine and in my sleep induced fog I noted that I would have to run out and get some.  I rubbed some of the sleep from my eyes, asked my dog Atlas if he wanted to go for a walk.  Silly question really because he’s always ready for a walk.

After our walk to the bridge I fed Atlas, grabbed my keys, and headed out in pursuit of my caffeine fix.  The radio was on the talk new station and I caught the tail end of a news story.  “We’ll have more on this tragic news coming out of Aurora later.  What news?  What happened?  The station broke for commercials and I arrived at my destination.

I got back in my car to head back home and the local morning show was discussing Cowboys receiver Dez Bryant arrested in assault on his mother.  This discussion was the static in the background as I began making a mental note of all the things I had on my plate for today.

·          Pack for trip
·         Make some Tazo Wild Sweet Orange Tea for trip
·         Clean fridge
·         Do laundry

Just as I pulled up into my driveway the radio host said that there would be more about the tragedy in Aurora after the traffic report.  I was clueless.  I wondered what happened. 

When I walked through the door I flicked on the television to learn that a heavily armed gunman attacked an Aurora, Colorado, movie theater early Friday, tossing tear gas before opening fire on the terrified audience and killing 12 and wounding 38.  One of the victims was only 3 months old. 

Police said the gunman appeared in the front of the theater and threw a smoke bomb before opening fire.  Some people in the audience thought the thick smoke and gunfire was a special effect accompanying the movie, police and witnesses said.

Witnesses watching movies in theaters next to the one where the shooting took place said bullets tore through the theater walls and they heard screaming.

The suspect, James Holmes, 24, of the 1600 block of Paris Street in Aurora, was caught by police in the parking lot of the Century 16 Movie Theaters.  Holmes was dressed in his riot gear, an outfit eerily similar to a villain in "The Dark Knight Rises." He warned police that his Aurora apartment was booby-trapped.  Police believe he acted alone.

Holmes, originally of San Diego, Calif., was in Colorado pursuing a PhD, sources told ABC News. He was a student at the University of Colorado Denver Medical Campus but he withdrew in June.

Police have blocked off a three-block area around an apartment complex in north Aurora where Holmes lived. 

 

In an eerie coincidence there was a scene in the 1986 comic Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. The comic features a crazed, gun-toting loner who walks into a movie theater and begins shooting it up, killing three in the process. The passage concludes with the media blaming Batman for inspiring the shooting, though he is not involved in the incident at all.

Of course partisan politics rears its ugly head as Breitbart Furthermore, the James Holmes for whom records were obtained by Breitbart News registered as a Democrat on June 14, 2011. He registered from an address in La Plata County, Colorado, and his status is listed as "inactive."  On the other hand ABC News' Brian Ross and George Stephanopoulos speculated on Good Morning America that Holmes was a Tea Party member, based solely on a name appearing on a Tea Party website.

ABC News has since walked this back and Brian Ross are apologizing for an "incorrect" report that James Holmes, the suspect in the Colorado theater shooting, may have had connections to the Tea Party.

"An earlier ABC News broadcast report suggested that a Jim Holmes of a Colorado Tea Party organization might be the suspect, but that report was incorrect," ABC News said in a statement. "ABC News and Brian Ross apologize for the mistake, and for disseminating that information before it was properly vetted."

In a similar statement released minutes earlier, ABC News said the report was "incorrect" but, rather than apologize, wrote: "Several other local residents with similar names were also contacted via social media by members of the public who mistook them for the suspect." The statement appeared at first to be an attempt by the network to abdicate responsibility for the report.