James Holmes Labeled Homicidal By Psychiatrist A Month Before Massacre
A month before the July 20 mass murder at an Aurora, Colo., theater, a psychiatrist who treated suspect James Holmes told campus police that Holmes had homicidal thoughts and was a danger to the public, the Associated Press reported.
According to new documents released on Thursday, Dr. Lynne Fenton, a psychiatrist at the University of Colorado, Denver, told authorities in June that Holmes also intimidated and threatened her a month before the massacre in which 12 people were killed and 70 were injured.
Days after the shooting, campus police claimed they never had any contact with Holmes, a graduate student at the university.
But officer Lynn Whitten said Fenton had contacted authorities while meeting her legal requirement as a psychiatrist to report threats, a search warrant affidavit noted.
"Dr. Fenton advised that through her contact with James Holmes she was reporting, per her requirement, his danger to the public due to homicidal statements he had made," the affidavit said.
Whitten said that Holmes sent Fenton threatening texts after he stopped seeing her for guidance, according to the documents.
After news broke that a psychiatrist had called Holmes a danger to the public, Democratic state lawmaker Beth McCann said she would introduce a new bill as soon as Friday to restrict mentally ill people from buying guns, but she later revised her statement saying that no date had been set, the AP wrote.
A ban on large-capacity firearm magazines has been passed because of the theater massacre.
Last week, Holmes attempted to plead guilty for the attacks, but his offer was rejected by prosecutors, who are seeking the death penalty.
New details of the case were in previously sealed documents that a judge ordered released Thursday, according to CBS Denver. The Associated Press and other media outlets had argued that a “wealth of information already made public in the proceedings thus far,” so there wasn't a basis for the documents to remain sealed, CBS added.
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