‘Dark Knight’ killer gets thousands of years in jail

WASHINGTON: A Colorado court on Wednesday formally sentenced James Eagan Holmes ( pix) to 12 life sentences without parole and an additional 3,318 years in prison for a movie theatre massacre in 2012 that was one of the worst mass shootings in US history.

“I want to make it clear that it is the court’s intention that the defendant never set foot in free society again,” judge Carlos A. Samour said after reading the sentences for 12 first-degree murders, 67 attempted first-degree murders, three attempted second-degree murders and explosives possession.

“If ever there was a case that warranted the maximum sentence, this is it,” Samour said.

Holmes stormed the packed theatre in Aurora, Colorado during a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises on July 20, 2012, and opened fire on the audience, killing Jonathan Blunk, Alexander Boik, Jesse Childress, Gordon Cowden, Jessica Ghawi, John Larimer, Matthew McQuinn, Micayla Medek, Veronica Moser-Sullivan, Alex Sullivan, Alexander Teves and Rebecca Wingo, and injuring 70 others as they tried to flee.

Prosecutors had asked jurors to sentence Holmes to execution after they convicted him on all counts on July 17.

But after emotional testimonies by both victims and Holmes’ own family, one juror refused to join the others for the unanimous verdict required by Colorado’s death penalty law, according to another juror who spoke to local media about the deliberations.

Instead, Samour on Wednesday handed down the maximum sentences short of death: life in prison without parole for each of the 12 murders, 48 years in prison for each attempted first-degree murder, 32 years for each attempted second-degree murder, and six years for the explosives charge.

Colorado law requires the sentences be served consecutively.

Appearing as emotionless as he had throughout his trial, Holmes stood with his lawyer at a podium facing Samour as he read the sentences.

But Samour never addressed him directly.

“The defendant does not deserve any sympathy,” he told the court, explaining the sentences. – dpa