James Holmes sentenced to life in prison for theater attack

1	The Colorado madman who orchestrated a heinous shooting spree inside a packed movie theater in 2012 will be sentenced to life in prison without parole after a jury failed to agree Friday on whether he should get the death penalty.
2	James Holmes, 28, who killed 12 people and injured 70 others during the massacre, faced death by lethal injection.
3	The jury's announcement came after hearing three months of emotional testimony from survivors - some who were left maimed and confined to wheelchairs - and his family, who had pleaded for mercy on his life.
4	"Thank you, jurors, for letting reason and not emotion guide you in your decision," Jordan Ghawi, whose sister, Jessica Ghawi, was murdered in the attack, responded to the news on Twitter.
5	"Three years of anguish and $5 million for a verdict that the defense had already agreed to," he added.
6	The case could have ended the same way two years ago when Holmes offered to plead guilty if he could avoid the death penalty.
7	Prosecutors rejected the offer.
8	As the verdict was read, Holmes' mother, Arlene, who had pleaded for jurors to spare her son's life, began sobbing.
9	Tears broke out across the courtroom.
10	In the back, Aurora police officers who responded to the bloody scene of Holmes' attacks began crying.
11	Ashley Moser, whose 6-year-old daughter Veronica Moser-Sullivan died in the attack and who was herself paralyzed by Holmes' bullets, shook her head and slowly leaned it against the wheelchair of another paralyzed victim, Caleb Medley.
12	"We have to abide by it, and we have to accept it. We just have to deal with it and accept it," said Veronica's grandfather Robert Sullivan, responding to the verdict.
13	Families of victims began to leave the courtroom as Judge Carlos Samour continued reading the verdict.
14	"The thought that this monster gets to have visitation from his parents and gets to receive mail and pictures from his very strange girlfriends is very hard to accept, but this is what it is," said Sandy Phillips, whose 24-year-old daughter Jessica Ghawi was killed in the attack.
15	Holmes showed no reaction as the 15-week trial came to a close.
16	The jury of nine women and three men, who had the option of executing Holmes, ejected his insanity defense and convicted him on all counts in the July 20, 2012 attack.
17	The victims had packed the Aurora, Colo., theater for a midnight showing of "The Dark Knight Rises" when Holmes, wearing a gas mask, body armor and bright red hair, ambushed them with an assault rifle, shotgun and pistol.
18	As victims desperately tried to run or hide to escape the bloodshed, prosecutors said the former neuroscience graduate student wildly sprayed the room with bullets before he was arrested in the parking lot.
19	Jurors viewed graphic images and even a 45-minute video of the dead inside the theater hours before announcing they had reached their decision.