24-year-old James Holmes entered the Century 6 movie theater in suburban Denver early Friday about 12:30 a.m., during the midnight screening of the new Batman movie “The Dark Knight Rises” and opened fire, killing at least 12 people and injuring 50 others.
James Holmes, who was wearing a gas mask, black SWAT gear, a “ballistic helmet,” a bulletproof vest, leggings, a throat protector, a groin protector, a gas mask and protective gloves. came through an emergency door at a movie theater in Colorado early Friday, hurled two canisters of an unknown gas and opened fire on the stunned audience.
The gunman looked calm and said nothing as he walked up an aisle, firing as he went, witnesses said.
The gunman “was aiming anywhere,” survivor Chris Ramos told CNN. “He was not aiming for a specific person. He was aiming for everyone.” Ramos said he believes the man in the seat next to him, the father of two daughters, was killed.
When the movie patrons realized the attack was real and not part of the movie, pandemonium erupted and they began to flee. The film continued to play on the screen as bloodied customers took refuge outside. According to witnesses on the scene, some of the bullets also went through the walls of an adjacent theater, injuring patrons.
“There was this one guy on all fours crawling. There was this girl spitting up blood. There were bullet holes in some people’s backs, in some people’s arms. There was one guy who was just stripped down to his boxers. It looked like he had been shot in the back or something,” said Donovan Tate
Soon after receiving a flood of 911 calls, hundreds of police officers, ambulance and emergency crews arrived on the scene.
The suspect was found near a car behind the theater and arrested.
“He did not resist,” police spokesman Frank Fania. “He did not put up a fight.”
Police also searched James Holmes’s North Aurora home after he spoke of “possible explosives in his residence,” Oates said. Authorities evacuated the building as a precautionary measure.
