Expert: Theater Shooter's Deadly Thoughts Became A Storm
CENTENNIAL, Colo. (AP/CBS4) - Thoughts of killing other people became an uncontrollable storm in the mind of the Aurora theater shooter in the months before the attack, a nationally known schizophrenia expert testified Tuesday.
James Holmes experienced fleeting thoughts about homicide previously, but he always found refuge in computer games and homework, said Dr. Raquel Gur, head of neuropsychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania medical school.
But after Holmes enrolled in a doctoral neuroscience program at the University of Colorado in 2011, the power of those thoughts "was in some ways like a storm," Gur testified.
Gur said Holmes suffered from schizophrenia at the time of the crime, and she is expected to say she believes he was legally insane when he killed 12 people and wounded 70 during the July 20, 2012, attack on a suburban Denver movie theater.
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Her testimony is crucial as defense attorneys argue that during the shooting, Holmes was in the grips of a psychotic episode that rendered him unable to tell right from wrong - the threshold for an insanity verdict in Colorado.
"I agree, there wouldn't have been a shooting at all" if Holmes hadn't suffered from a psychotic disease, Gur told defense attorney Daniel King.
Prosecutors say he was sane and are seeking the death penalty.
Gur said she repeatedly asked Holmes why he did not kill himself instead of others, and he replied that he couldn't bring himself to do it.
When she asked him how he thought the victims and their families would feel, he was shocked.
"It was something that he did not consider," she said.
Gur interviewed Holmes for 28 hours over two years and studied the spiral notebook in which he scrawled elaborate plans for the massacre.
Gur also has evaluated Unabomber Ted Kaczynski and Jared Loughner, who killed six people and wounded 13 more near Tucson, Arizona, in 2011.
She said Holmes is philosophical and highly intelligent, similar to Kaczynski.
"The higher functioning people, namely those who have greater intellectual capacity, are the ones who come up with the most bizarre delusions," she said.
An MRI done earlier this year showed parts of Holmes' brain that affect emotional response were smaller in volume than those of a healthy brain, possibly affecting his ability to make rational decisions, Gur said. Throughout her conversations with Holmes, he seemed flat and emotionless, a possible indicator of schizophrenia.
Of the doctors who examined Holmes for the defense, Gur spent the most time with him and interviewed his parents.
But her testimony will be highly contentious. Prosecutors spent nearly two days tearing apart the testimony of another psychiatrist who said he found Holmes was insane. But CBS Legal Analyst Karen Steinhauser says Gur is a strong witness.
"Dr. Gur's testimony is extremely important. This is a doctor who has impeccable credentials, she is not somebody who just testifies in court for a living," Steinhauser said.
Gur's findings also differ from those of two court-appointed doctors who studied Holmes in the months and years after the shooting and found him legally sane at the time of the attack.
"He was not able to distinguish between right or wrong," Gur said.
In two days of questioning by defense lawyer Daniel King, Gur said Holmes' thoughts about killing other people had become an uncontrollable storm in his mind in the months before the attack.
District Attorney George Brauchler immediately launched an aggressive attack on Gur's credibility, saying she once wrote that trial witnesses can be influenced by the side that calls them to testify.
Gur retorted that Brauchler was taking the statement out of context.
Brauchler also questioned the accuracy of the notes she took during her meetings with Holmes and suggested she came to a hasty conclusion about his mental illness and sanity.
By SADIE GURMAN, Associated Press
CBS4 Staff contributed to this report.
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