Colorado Shooting Suspect Formally Charged

Accused movie theater shooter James Holmes was charged with 24 counts of first degree murder today, two counts for each of the people he is accused of killing during an alleged shooting spree at a movie theater in Aurora, Colo., on July 20.

The 24-year-old PhD student is accused of a mass killing in which he sprayed three weapons’ full of ammunition into a crowded movie theater during the midnight premiere screening of the latest Batman movie, “The Dark Knight Rises.” Twelve people were killed and 58 were wounded in the worst mass shooting in U.S. history.

Today, he was officially read his charges in Aurora District Court. Each death carried two separate murder charges, one for showing premeditation and one for showing extreme indifference to life. Both of the charges carry the death penalty as a possible sentence.

He was also charged with 116 counts of attempted first degree murder, as well as one count of possessing an explosive device and one count of violent crime.

Prosecutors will have 60 days from the date of the arraignment to decide if they will seek the death sentence for Holmes.

This was the second time Holmes has appeared in court.His first appearance in court on July 23 raised questions among some observers about his mental competency. The suspected shooter appeared dazed with his head drooping at times.

The judge also heard arguments today about a package Holmes mailed to his psychiatrist at the University of Colorado, Lynne Fenton. Holmes’ attorneys filed a motion Friday demanding that the court “immediately produce all discovery pertaining to the seizure of the package.”

The Arapahoe County District Attorney’s office, representing the state, filed an objection to the motion and asked that it be denied. The DA said that the motion by Holmes’s attorneys was “based on certain factual assumptions that are not established by evidence and that the People believe are of dubious validity, if not outright incorrect.”

ABC NEWS REPORTS.

Colorado Movie Theater Shooting: 70 Victims The Largest Mass Shooting

Twelve people were killed and 58 were injured in Aurora, Colo., during a sold-out midnight premier of the new Batman movie “The Dark Knight Rises” when 24-year-old James Holmes unloaded four weapons’ full of ammunition into the unsuspecting crowd.

The number of casualties makes the incident the largest mass shooting in U.S. history.

Holmes, a graduate student at a nearby college with a clean arrest record, entered movie auditorium wearing a ballistics helmet, bullet-proof vest, bullet-proof leggings, gas mask and gloves. He detonated multiple smoke bombs, and then began firing at viewers in the sold-out auditorium, police said today.

Bullets from the spree tore through the theater and into adjoining theaters, where at least one other person was struck and injured. Ten members of “The Dark Knight Rises” audience were killed in theater, while two others died later at area hospitals. Numerous patrons were in critical condition at six local hospitals, the Aurora police said this afternoon.

Authorities began removing bodies this afternoon, according to affiliate ABC7 Eyewitness News.

Holmes was apprehended within minutes of the 12:39 a.m. shooting at his car behind the theater, where police found him in full riot gear and carrying three weapons, including a AR-15 assault rifle, which can hold upwards of 100 rounds, a Remington 12 gauge shot gun, and a .40 Glock handgun. A fourth handgun was found in the vehicle. Agents from the federal bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms are tracing the weapons.

According to police sources, Holmes told the officers arresting him that he was “The Joker,” referring to the villain in the second installment of the Batman movie trilogy, “The Dark Knight.” He also warned police that he had booby-trapped his apartment, leading officers to evacuate the Aurora apartment building.

Police Chief Dan Oates said today that police and bomb squads have found a large number of explosive devices and trip wires at Holmes’ apartment and have not yet decided how to proceed without setting off explosions.

“The pictures we have from inside the apartment are pretty disturbing considering how elaborate the apartment is booby trapped,” police said outside of the apartment complex today. The “flammable and explosive” materials could have blown up Holmes’ apartment building and the ones near it, police said.

The apartment complex is home exclusively to University of Colorado Medical Center students, patients, and staff members, residents tell ABC News.

Moviegoer Christopher Ramos today recalled the real-life horror of the midnight premiere of the latest Batman movie, “The Dark Knight Rises,” in Aurora, Colo., as a gunman decked in riot gear set off smoke bombs and opened fire on the unsuspecting audience.

“People were running everywhere, running on top of me, like kicking me, jumping over me. And there were bodies on the ground,” Ramos said. “I froze up. I was scared. I honestly thought I was going to die.”

“The image in our heads is stuck in there. I still have the ticket right here and honestly, I’m never going to forget this night at all. Because it was the first time I saw something that was real. Like a real-life nightmare that was there, not dreaming of,” Ramos told ABC News today.

Witnesses in the movie theater said Holmes saw smoke and heard gunshots that they thought were part of the movie until they saw Holmes standing in front of the screen, after entering from an emergency exit. Holmes methodically stalked the aisles of the theater, shooting people at random, as panicked movie-watchers in the packed auditorium tried to escape, witnesses said.

At one point the shooter exited the theater only to wait outside the doors and pick off patrons as they tried to exit, witness Jennifer Seeger told “Good Afternoon America.”

Read more of this story on ABC’s Good Morning America