AURORA | Several victims of the Aurora theater shooting say secrecy surrounding where the gunman is being housed violates their rights.
After being convicted last year of killing 12 and wounding 70 more in the July 2012 attack, James Holmes was moved from Colorado Department of Corrections custody to an undisclosed prison. Arapahoe County prosecutors say even they don’t know where the convicted killer is serving his life sentence.
Lisa Teesch-Maguire, one of the prosecutors who handled the case, said she knows of at least three victims who have filed a complaint with the Colorado Division of Criminal Justice arguing the state’s decision to keep the gunman’s location secret violates the Colorado Victims’ Rights Act.
The division’s Victims’ Rights Act Subcommittee is set to hear the complaint Friday, May 20.
It’s not clear what the Division of Criminal Justice could do with the complaint. Officials there did not immediately return a call for comment Wednesday.
Teesch-Maguire said she isn’t sure the division could compel the Colorado Department of Corrections to disclose the gunman’s location, but she said the victims would like to know details about his time in prison, including what privileges he has and who is allowed to visit him.
“What does his daily life look like, which are things the victims want to know,” she said.
Holmes was convicted in August 2015 of opening fire in a crowded Aurora movie theater in July 2012. Jurors could not agree that he deserved the death penalty, so he is serving a life sentence.
Some victims testified during Holmes’ sentencing that they didn’t want him imprisoned in California, closer to his parents who live near San Diego. Prison officials had assured prosecutors last year that they would not move him there.
Documents provided to The Associated Press and other news outlets through open-records requests later revealed that Holmes was transferred partly because another inmate pushed his way through a partially open door and attacked him when he was being held in Colorado’s highest security prison.
Prison officials believed other inmates were likely to continue to target Holmes “because of the high profile nature of his crimes,” according to the documents.
Not knowing Holmes’ location meant attorneys representing several shooting victims and their families in a lawsuit against theater owner Cinemark were not able to question him during their civil trial unfolding this week in state court.
Without Holmes’ testimony, attorneys were forced to rely on the spiral notebook in which he detailed elaborate plans for the killings.
— The Associated Press contributed to this report.