12 KILLED, 59 WOUNDED AT DARK KNIGHT RISES SCREENING NEAR DENVER (Update)

At least 12 persons have been killed and 59 wounded, many critically, in Aurora, CO, a suburb of Denver, after a masked gunman wearing body armor reportedly kicked open an exit door of a theater at 12:39 a.m., shortly after a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises had begun, set off a smoke or tear-gas canister, and began firing randomly into the crowd, Aurora Police Chief Dan Oates confirmed this afternoon (Friday). Several of the victims reportedly were small children, including at least one baby. Three theaters in the Century 16 Movie Theaters at the Aurora Town Center were showing the film at the time. Oates said that although the shooting took place in Theater 9, some rounds also penetrated the adjoining Theater 8 and struck at least one person there. Nineteen-year-old Salina Jordan told the Denver Post that she was watching the movie in Theater 8 when she heard what sounded like firecrackers coming from Theater 9. Then, she told the newspaper, someone ran into the theater yelling, “They’re shooting out here.” She told of seeing one girl who had been struck in the cheek, others in the stomach. One of the victims, she said, appeared to be a girl of about nine. Police, responding to 911 calls, entered the theater within one minute to a minute and a half after receiving the first call, which was followed by more than 100, Oates said. They quickly took into custody 24-year-old James Holmes, a former resident of San Diego who had dropped out of a doctoral program in neuroscience at the University of Colorado medical school last month. They said he surrendered outside the theater in his car parked in the rear of the theater. Three weapons in the car were confiscated; a fourth was removed from the theater. Oates said that Holmes was “dressed in black, wearing a ballistic [bullet proof] helmet, a tactical ballistic vest, ballistic leggings, a throat protector and a groin protector, a gas mask and black tactical gloves.” Oates said that Holmes had booby-trapped his apartment with various incendiary devices and that five apartments in the area had been evacuated while experts attempted to disarm the devices.