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Courtesy of the Blunk family
Aurora shooting victim, Jonathan Blunk, and his children, 2-year-old Maximus and 4-year-old Hailey. Blunk's cousin, Jessica Watts, attended Monday's hearing.
As police officers fought back tears on the witness stand Monday, Sam Soudani was struck by how little James Holmes seemed to feel.
"It's like a robot," said Soundani, whose daughter, Farrah, 23, was critically wounded in the July 20 massacre at an Aurora, Colo., movie theater. "Absolutely no emotion."
Soudani was one of many victims' relatives and survivors who attended the first day of a weeklong hearing where prosecutors are laying out their case against Holmes to convince a judge there's enough evidence for a trial.
He told NBC News that he came to the courthouse to support his daughter, who is still recovering from the wounds she suffered in the bloodbath -- which claimed 12 lives and left dozens injured.
"I just wanted to hold her hand," he said.
But Farrah decided she didn’t want to see Holmes “face to face” and stayed in an overflow room while her father wept as Sgt. Gerald Jonsgaard testified about futilely searching for the pulse of 6-year-old Veronica Moser-Sullivan.
"Heartbreaking," Soudani said.
James Holmes 'very relaxed' after theater massacre, officer says
Holmes, 25, a former neuroscience doctoral student, displayed no discernible reaction during the moving testimony. And Soudani said the suspect didn't even deserve his hatred.
“I don't feel anything toward him,” he said. “It's hard to explain. I mean, part of me wanted to rip his head off and part of me just couldn't care less for him."
Jessica Watts, whose cousin Jonathan Blunk was killed in the shooting, also noted that Holmes seemed "disinterested" in the proceedings.
Family members of Jonathan Blunk, one of the victims of Friday's mass shooting in Aurora, Colo., attend a prayer vigil, Sunday, July 22, 2012, in Aurora, Colo.
Blunk, a military veteran and father of two, died shielding his date from the bullets. Watts said it was important for her to be at the hearing for "closure" and also to make sure the prosecution's case is strong.
She said it was "horrifying" to hear the witnesses describe the scene in the theater when they arrived.
"I can't imagine what these victims went through. Then again, I can't imagine what these first responders went through 'cause they're human beings, too," she said.
"Mainly the emotions struck me, the emotions of the officers testifying," she said. "It's very, very hard to hear."
Soudani said being in court was “agony” for him and he doesn’t think he can bear to return for any more testimony.
NBC News' Jack Chesnutt contributed to this report.
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Holmes has been medicated for his mental illness and his disinterest is the way the medicines work.People should read up on diseases and conditions of the brain,the treatments for them and how it affects the human body and mind.Maybe then they would not be making these comments about him being like a robot.I'm sorry for all the families involved but I do not hear about any of them advocating for better mental health care in this country.I don't hear Gabby Gifford advocating for better mental health care either.If this happened to a family member of mine I wouldn't be wasting time in court or talking to the media.I'd be writing to all of my elected politicians asking when will this country get serious about having better and more facilities the mentally ill.
There will always be people born or acquiring mental/emotional disorders and diseases. They are like suckers, there is one born every minute. Better mental health care, absolutely. But some with fall through the cracks and find themselves in the streets angry and armed with an AR-15 in 2013, 2014, 2015, etc..
Stop the massacres and get those semi-auto guns off people's hands. It is simple.
Those are war weapons meant to incur as much damage as fast as possible to as many "enemies" possible. The civilian social life is not a combat theater, or is it an I didn't get the memo?
The victims have enough on their minds, they don't need to be advocates right now too. The ones who are lucky to still be alive have plenty of time for that later. They have enough of a burden right now. I don't think there's a lack of people being vocal about the need for better access to mental health care right now. The issue is out there and live. Lay off the victims; they are entitled to their feelings.
just a cleaning lady - Boy, did you hit the nail on the head. I was thinking the same thing. I feel horrible for these families and those injured. That said, if we really want to mitigate this type of stuff, we really need to start taking mental illness more seriously in this Country. Of course Holmes acts like a robot - he's drugged up and his brain just doesn't work right.
and...
Laser Guided Loogie - Re: comment on "top level" care - having a family member with a violent form of Schizophrenia and living as functional a life as possible, the type of mental illness most of these people have requires a community of people to take care of them and help them, round-the-clock, to live non-violently and functionally. It's unfortunate, but it's the truth. Yes, it's costly, but the person I speak of would probably have fatally hurt someone had it not been for proper medication and supervision over the years. This person is medicated 24hr/daily, receives serious psychiatric assistance, lives in a supervised group home, and works a small job. This is what it takes, this should be the kind of top level care given to people like Holmes. But, we are in denial as a society on this stuff because we have our priorities all messed up. Also, Holmes needs more than SSRI's. Sorry this guy is pretty sick - he may be sane under the legal definition, but not otherwise.
Cleaning Lady, James Holmes was already being treated by a top U.S. Airforce psychiatrist, BEFORE the shooting! He was also part of a top level graduate research project that had him working with brain interfaces. He had access to the "top level" mind doctors and medicine in the field.
How much "better" do you need?
I put that in quotes, because frankly, these people are modern day witch doctors who don't know what they are doing.
The premise behind SSRI's (that the brain has a shortage of the neurotransmitter serotonin) has long been debunked. Most people's brains are flooded with serotonin within 24 hours of being on Prozac, for example, with no discernible change in symptoms.
What does happen is that they lose inhibitions. Sometimes they kill other people, and sometimes they kill themselves. It says so on the insert.
-Ken
LASER: would you please state your qualifications, degrees, etc....??????
Also state your "source" for and name of the AirForce psychiatrist?????
Would you also "source" your information about PROZAC, serotonin, and inferred SSRI research.
If you have none of the above.....you talk too much.
James Holmes was being treated by a specialized psychiatrist? Where did you guys read that? Is this some kind of Bourne Legacy stuff...you know how that researcher, doing classified work on a neural re-programming drug meant to help high level political assassins, suddenly goes berserk? Like a robot he shoots everyone in his team and in the room. I thought that was just a fiction. Are you guys suggesting some kind of classified research is going on, and ordinary people, or grad students, like David Kazinsky, are participating in some mind altering program? Or...subjected to it without knowing it? You guys are reading too much sic-fi or thriller books. I want good investigative work. Otherwise too many speculations.
He is not like a robot. He is a robot. There is one fast brainwashing method developed and used by surviving KGB agents worldwide to organize arson, massacres, suicides, and so on.
If you are interested to explore this possibility, search the web for "GULAG KGB agents". These are those KGB spies who killed over 10 million Soviet people (and thousands of foreigners abroad) and the rest of the world still does not care...