1:30 p.m. update
AURORA | District Attorney George Brauchler hammered the defense’s star witness — psychiatrist and schizophrenia expert Raquel Gur — during cross examination Wednesday morning in the Aurora theater shooting trial.
Brauchler, whose cross examination started late Tuesday and will continue this afternoon, said Gur was the only doctor who said Holmes used the phrase “call to action” when he met with her.
With another doctor, Holmes said he had never used the phrase in his life.
“You don’t find in the record anywhere other than with you that this defendant has ever written, texted, chatted or uttered the phrase ‘call for action,’” Brauchler said.
Gur said the discrepancy makes sense considering Holmes’ mental illness and his desire not to discuss it. Plus, she said, Holmes could have simply felt more comfortable with her than he did with other doctors.
“He didn’t want to appear sick, he didn’t, so he was trying to do his best not to reveal the significant mental defect that he had,” she said.
But Brauchler said “call to action” was Gur’s phrase, not Holmes’. He pointed to a book she wrote in 1991 about adolescent schizophrenia where she named a chapter: “Call to Action.”
Gur scoffed at that and said the context of her book chapter was completely different from the context in which Holmes used the phrase.
Brauchler also said Gur appeared to combine different thoughts from Holmes into single quotes in her notes.
Gur said that may have happened, but was a matter of forgetting an ellipses and nothing more.
9:53 a.m. update
AURORA | The Aurora theater shooting trial resumed Wednesday with what could be bruising cross examination of the defense’s star witness.
Raquel Gur, a University of Pennsylvania psychiatrist who found accused shooter James Holmes to be schizophrenic and insane, is testifying for the third straight day.
District Attorney George Brauchler, who started cross examining Gur on Tuesday, resumed his questions Wednesday and focused on Gur’s decision not to talk to Holmes’ parents before she made her diagnosis.
Gur said with the Holmes family in San Diego and her in Philadelphia, it was difficult to align their schedules. Plus, Gur said, she reviewed reports from the family written by other doctors and said she had a good idea what Holmes’ childhood and background were like.
Holmes is accused of killing 12 and wounding 70 others during the July 2012 attack on an Aurora movie theater. He has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity; prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.
The defense is expected to wrap their case this week and closing arguments could start Monday.
But, Brauchler said, Gur could have just called the Holmes family but opted not to and instead relied on reports provided to her by Holmes’ lawyers.
Still, Gur said, even after she talked to the Holmes family — nearly two years after she wrote her first report — they didn’t provide her with any information that was different from what she knew when she wrote the report.