Jurors deciding the fate of the Aurora movie theater gunman will not take a trip to Colorado’s death row, hear about prison conditions or examine punishments meted out in other murder cases, according to released late Monday.
Arapahoe County Judge Carlos Samour also allowed jurors to hear expert testimony about and , but he blocked defense attorneys from presenting arguments during a possible death-penalty sentencing hearing about how jurors should handle over James Holmes’ guilt.
The orders are the latest to tie up loose arguments in advance of the case’s long-awaited trial, which is now . Holmes, who has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, is charged with dozens of counts of murder and attempted murder for the July 2012 attack on the Century Aurora 16 theater. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
Defense attorneys have asked Samour to be able to take jurors in Sterling, as well as the state’s execution chamber in Cañon City. Prosecutors simultaneously asked Samour to block the defense from presenting and from arguing in an attempt to show that a death sentence in the theater shooting case would be “disproportionate.”
Samour’s denial of the defense motion and approval of the prosecutions’ is in keeping where he has limited the evidence jurors can hear during a death penalty hearing to the facts of the case and statements about Holmes’ character.
Meanwhile, officials from the Colorado Mental Health Institute in Pueblo that they have appointed a new doctor to perform a second psychiatric exam on Holmes. Samour earlier found deficiencies in the original evaluation and agreed with prosecutors that . But while the doctor who will perform that evaluation — whose name was redacted in court papers — has now been appointed, the evaluation itself is on hold while Samour considers defense objections to his order about the new evaluation.
John Ingold: 303-954-1068, jingold@denverpost.com or twitter.com/john_ingold
