CTVNews.ca Staff
Published Friday, Jul. 20, 2012 6:11AM EDT
Last Updated Friday, Jul. 20, 2012 11:38AM EDT
One man has been arrested following a mass shooting at a movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado that left 12 people dead and 38 injured.
The suspected gunman opened fire in a packed theatre about 16 kilometres outside of Denver during a midnight screening of the new Batman movie, “The Dark Knight Rises,” early Friday morning.
Police have identified the 24-year-old suspect as James Holmes.
A search of Holmes’ north Aurora apartment revealed “very sophisticated booby traps, flammable and explosive material,” Reuters reporter Stephanie Simon told CTV News Channel.
“It could be hours, it could be days before they figure out how to disarm it,” said Simon from Aurora.
Residents living in the low-rise apartment and five other nearby buildings were evacuated after Holmes told Aurora police he was in possession of explosives.
Aurora Police Chief Dan Oates said at about 12:30 a.m. the lone gunman released some sort of canister at the front of the movie threatre before opening fire on the crowd.
“They heard a hissing sound and some gas emerged and the gunman opened fire,” he said.
CNN’s Rene Marsh told CTV’s Canada AM on Friday that witnesses at the scene said the shooter was wearing a riot helmet, a bullet-proof vest and dressed from head to toe in black.
Marsh said that “very young” victims were seen being carried out of the theatre in police officers’ arms.
Ten people were reportedly killed on the scene.
Local reporter Bertha Lynn described the scene in Aurora on Friday as “terrifying.”
“The thing that comes to mind immediately is the Columbine High School shooting, this incident dredges up those horrible memories.”
Dozens of victims are being treated at Denver-area hospitals, and four remain in critical condition. Local media are reporting the youngest victim is only four months old.
Dr. Frank Lansville, a spokesperson for the Aurora Medical Centre, said of the 15 victims rushed to the hospital, many were “on the younger side.”
He said the patients in critical condition were suffering from gunshot wounds to their neck, torso and abdomen.
“Certainly this is a very difficult time for those patients, but we’re very optimistic,” Lansville told reporters from outside the hospital.
The mass shooting, the deadliest since the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre, shocked residents throughout the country.
During a campaign stop in Florida, U.S. President Barack Obama offered his condolences to the Aurora community. He said Friday was a day for “prayer and reflection.
“If there’s anything to take away from this tragedy it’s the reminder that life is very fragile. Our time here is limited and it is precious.”
Meanwhile, many in the Denver suburb of 325,000 are left wondering what would provoke such an attack in the community.
Professor of criminology and author of ‘Extreme Killing: Understand Serial and Mass Killing’ James Alan Fox said mass shootings in public places are almost always premeditated.
“These tend to be well-planned executions,” he told Canada AM. “Although he did not know his victims, and in that case it’s random, what was not random was when he chose to commit this murder and where.”
Fox predicted that in the aftermath of the shooting the issue of increased security in public places will arise. However he warned, “We can’t make our society look like an armed fortress.
“Unfortunately, these such events, and they are rare although they don’t seem it, are one of the big prices we pay for the freedom we enjoy.”
With files from The Associated Press
