The alleged gunman in the movie theater massacre sent a package to a
faculty member at the University of Colorado medical campus that was found
unopened in a mailroom Monday, law enforcement officials said Wednesday.
A girl signs
a message board at a memorial across the street from the Century 16 movie
theater in Aurora, Colo.
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Two law
enforcement officials said that it contained a "document" but that
they did not know whether it was a notebook detailing plans for violence, as
Fox News reported.
One official
said authorities hope the document will shed light on how the attack was
planned and carried out.
The
officials declined to be named because a court order bars investigators and
others from talking about the case.
The package
was sent before the rampage that killed 12 people and injured 58 at a showing
of the latest Batman movie at a multiplex here early Friday, the officials
said.
It was
delivered by the Postal Service on Monday and was immediately turned over to
police, a statement issued by the university said. University officials
declined further comment, citing the court order.
Discovery of
the mail from James Holmes, who recently dropped out of a neuroscience graduate
program at the university, was first reported by Fox News. It said the package
contained a notebook "full of details about how he was going to kill
people" and drawings of stick figures being shot.
NBC News
reported that Holmes told investigators to look for the package. The university
disclosed earlier that it had twice found packages that appeared to be
suspicious after the shooting. "The buildings were locked down for several
hours while authorities investigated. In both cases, the packages were deemed
not a threat to safety on the campus," the university said in a statement
on its website.
The latest
discovery raises questions about whether Holmes' behavior had alarmed faculty
or staff at the medical center where he was a student.
John
Banzhaf, a professor of public interest law at George Washington University,
said the discovery increases the likelihood the university will be sued by
victims "for negligent failure to take appropriate steps to prevent the
rampage."
He said
mailing the package to a psychiatrist, as Fox reported, could suggest that
Holmes had seen the doctor "in his professional capacity for therapy
and/or counseling." He said Holmes' withdrawal from the prestigious
graduate program "by itself would be a red flag" for a psychiatrist
or psychologist, and that if Holmes was being seen for therapy, the university
may have had a legal obligation to pay more attention to his mental condition.
"While
it might seem unreasonable to expect that a university would be able to detect
signs of potential dangerous mental instability in all of its thousands of
students, a reasonable argument can be made that it should have followed up at
least somewhat when a student suddenly and unexpectedly leaves a graduate
program, gives up a substantial financial stipend which is supporting his
lifestyle, is forced to move from his home, and consults a psychiatrist, — all
major stressors," Banzhaf said.
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