As Salon noted earlier this year, the case's judge has already ruled that should Holmes enter an insanity plea, prosecutors would be permitted to interrogate him using (improperly dubbed) "truth serum." Judge William Sylvester granted that a “narcoanalytic interview” could be employed to determine if Holmes is genuinely insane. This would entail injecting the accused mass murderer with gradual doses of a barbiturate (most likely sodium amytal) while prosecutors subject him to questioning. If used, the narcoanalytic interview would aim to determine whether Holmes is malingering (feigning illness) -- although experts have argued that there are better means to determine malingering.

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In her story, Winter cited unnamed law enforcement sources and quoted one source as saying the notebook was “full of details about how he was going to kill people.” Holmes' lawyers were given the okay to subpoena the reporter over these unattributed comments.

Winter's attorney has stated in court that if she is put on the witness stand, the veteran reporter will not answer questions related to the identification of her sources.

Fox News gives details on Winter's situation:

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They announced their intention to seek the death penalty against Holmes in court on Monday.

Last week prosecutors said they rejected an offer from Holmes' attorney to have him plead guilty to avoid the death penalty. Prosecutors said the offer to have Holmes spend life in prison wasn't a serious attempt at plea bargaining.

Holmes is charged with multiple counts of murder and attempted murder for the July 20 assault on a midnight screening of "The Dark Knight Rises" that killed 12 people and injured 70. His attorneys are expected to argue that he was legally insane at the time of the shooting.

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Behind-the-scenes maneuvering erupted into a public quarrel between prosecutors and the defense over Holmes' public offer to plead guilty, but the two sides could still come to an agreement that would spare Holmes's life in exchange for spending the rest of his life in prison.

"Even if they give notice on Monday that they are seeking the death penalty, they can come off that and enter into a plea bargain any time," said attorney Dan Recht, a past president of the Colorado Criminal Defense Bar.

As the tangled and bloody case returns to court, survivors and families of the victims are uncertain about what happens next.

If the case goes to trial, "all of us victims would be dragged along potentially for years," said Pierce O'Farrill, who was shot three times.

"It could be 10 or 15 years before he's executed. I would be in my 40s and I'm planning to have a family, and the thought of having to look back and reliving everything at that point in my life, it would be difficult," he said.

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No plea agreement exists, prosecutors said in a scathing court document Thursday, and one "is extremely unlikely based on the present information available to the prosecution."

They also said anyone reading news stories about the offer would inevitably conclude "the defendant knows that he is guilty, the defense attorneys know that he is guilty, and that both of them know that he was not criminally insane."

Neither the defense nor the prosecution immediately returned phone calls Thursday.

Holmes is charged with multiple counts of murder and attempted murder in the July 20 shootings in a packed theater in the Denver suburb of Aurora. Twelve people were killed and 70 were injured.

Holmes' attorneys disclosed in a court filing Wednesday that their client has offered to plead guilty, but only if he wouldn't be executed.

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The Washington Times wrote a short report, which was quickly picked up by Fox Nation, conservative blogs and, naturally, the trifecta of the Islamophobic blogosphere: Pamela Geller’s Atlas Shrugs, Robert Spencer’s Jihad Watch, and David Horowitz’ Front Page.

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Judge William Sylvester did not in so many words grant the use of truth serum on Holmes, because truth serum is the stuff of Hogwarts and not juridical determinations. What Sylvester granted was that a "narcoanalytic interview" could be employed to determine if Holmes is genuinely insane. This would entail injecting the accused mass murderer with gradual doses of a barbiturate (most likely sodium amytal) while prosecutors subject him to questioning.

Like taking other barbiturates (or even just a few too many stiff drinks), sodium amytal (also known as sodium amobarbital) can function to lower inhibitions and prompts willingness to talk. In his column on "'Truth serum' and 'what really happened'," psychiatrist August Piper detailed how narcoanalytic interviews typically proceed:

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If Holmes is convicted, he could be executed or spend the rest of his life in prison. Judge William Sylvester said Holmes, 25, can change his plea to not guilty by reason of insanity later, if he chooses.

Such a change could be the only way Holmes could avoid life in prison or execution.

Prosecutors, for their part, have not said yet whether they will pursue the death penalty, announcing Tuesday that they will make their decision known on April 1.

The judge set Aug. 5 for the start of the trial. Prosecutors and defense attorneys declined comment.

As he has done in past hearings, Holmes sat silently through Tuesday's proceedings. He wore a red jail jumpsuit and sported a thick, bushy beard and unkempt dark brown hair.

When he walked into the courtroom, he looked at his parents, James and Arlene Holmes. They sat silently at the front of the room and left without comment after the hearing.

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The former Century 16, now renovated and renamed the Century Aurora, opened its doors to victims of the July 20 attack on Thursday night with a somber remembrance ceremony and a special showing of "The Hobbit."

Theater 9, where neuroscience graduate student James Holmes allegedly opened fire on a midnight screening of "The Dark Knight Returns," is now an XD theater with a wall-to-wall screen and stadium seating.

"We as a community have not been defeated," Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan told victims, officials, and dozens of police officers and other first responders who filled half the theater's seats at the ceremony.

"We are a community of survivors," Hogan declared. "We will not let this tragedy define us."

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District Judge William Sylvester ruled Thursday night that prosecutors had presented sufficient evidence to proceed with charges alleging that James Holmes killed 12 people and injured 70 others at a suburban Denver movie theater on July 20.

Holmes is charged with multiple counts of first-degree murder and attempted murder.

Holmes won't have to enter a plea until March 12 after the judge granted a defense motion to delay that proceeding.

A majority of the families of the victims objected to the delay.

An unidentified man seated in the courtroom yelled "Rot in hell Holmes" at the end of the hearing. The judge reconvened the proceedings to discuss the outburst

Defense lawyers didn't give a reason for the delay.

One possible reason could be to seek a mental health evaluation by a doctor of their choosing. His lawyers have said Holmes is mentally ill, raising the possibility of an insanity defense.

If Holmes had entered an insanity plea, an evaluation would be done by state doctors.

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Prosecutors who displayed the pictures at a hearing that ended Wednesday argued the photos display "identity, deliberation and extreme indifference."

Holmes' attorneys - who have been setting up an insanity defense and said they might present testimony about the defendant's mental health - decided not to call any witnesses.

A judge is due to rule by Friday whether prosecutors presented enough evidence to justify Holmes standing trial for more than 160 felony counts stemming from the July 20 attack, which killed 12 people and injured 70. Holmes, 25, may enter a formal plea that day.

The three-day hearing occurred as the nation still recovers from the shock of last month's shooting at a Connecticut elementary school that killed 20 children and six adults. It wrapped up just as the Colorado Legislature began its session and pledged to tackle gun violence, and Vice President Joe Biden met with families of victims as part of the White House's own gun control push.

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Holmes didn't resist arrest behind the theater and volunteered that his apartment had been booby trapped, the officers testified during the opening of a hearing in which prosecutors began laying out their case against the former neuroscience graduate student.

Officer Jason Oviatt said Holmes seemed "very, very relaxed" and didn't seem to have "normal emotional reactions" to things.

"He seemed very detached from it all," he said.

When Oviatt first saw Holmes in his gear standing next to his car behind the theater, he thought he was a fellow officer but then realized Holmes was standing still, and not rushing toward the theater.

Oviatt pointed his gun at him, handcuffed him and searched him. He said he found two knives and a semi-automatic handgun on top of Holmes' car. Oviatt said an ammunition magazine also fell out of Holmes' pocket and he found another one on the ground. He said Holmes was dripping in sweat and his pupils were wide open.

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Police Sgt. Cassidee Carlson said a SWAT team was called after gunshots were heard at the Aurora, Colo., home at about 3 a.m. Investigators said three victims, all of them adults, appeared to have been killed before officers arrived.

Carlson said the suspect shot at officers at about 8:15 a.m. and was killed during a gunfight about 45 minutes later when police entered the home. It remained unclear if officers shot the suspect or if he shot himself.

A motive for the killings also was unknown.

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The parents, grandparents, cousins and widow of nine of the 12 people killed released a letter sent to the theater's owner, Cinemark, in which they criticized the Plano, Texas-based company for not reaching out to the families of victims to offer their condolences. They also said the company refused to meet with them one-on-one without lawyers present.

The families said they were asked to attend an "evening of remembrance" followed by a movie when the Aurora theater reopens on Jan. 17 in invitations sent two days after Christmas.

"Thanks for making what is a very difficult holiday season that much more difficult. Timing is everything and yours is awful," they wrote.

The company had no immediate comment.

Cinemark has been renovating the Aurora theater and plans to re-open it Jan. 17, a move the city's mayor said had widespread support in the community. Gov. John Hickenlooper is among those planning to attend.

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The details seem to form an all-too-familiar profile: the loner, withdrawn, highly intelligent, ghostly pale, awkward but pleasant seeming enough. He wore oversize formal shirts with pens, sheathed in pocket protectors, in their top pockets. In lieu of a photo in his high school yearbook were the words, "camera shy."

His brother, Ryan, called him a "nerd," one of his classmates mother's said he was "one of the goths." He was assigned to a school psychologist when staff at Newtown High School thought he might be a risk to himself, not others.

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"They keep talking about fairness for him," said Shane Medek, whose 23-year-old sister Micayla Medek died in the July 20 shootings. "It's like they're babying this dude."

James Holmes is accused of opening fire in a movie theater, killing 12 people and injuring 58 others. His lawyers disclosed their belief that he suffers from a mental illness during a suburban Denver court hearing Thursday, when nearly two dozen news organizations asked a judge to unseal case documents.

Defense attorney Daniel King argued that the seal and a sweeping gag order ensure fairness. He also told the judge that the defense team needed more information from prosecutors and investigators.

"We cannot begin to assess the nature and the depth of Mr. Holmes' mental illness until we receive full disclosure," he said in court.

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We know about all of this. We know because the weekend of July 20 became all-Aurora-all-the-time, a round-the-clock engorgement of TV news reports, replete with massacre theme music, an endless loop of victims, their loved ones, eyewitness accounts, cellphone video, police briefings, informal memorials, and “healing,” all washed down with a presidential visit and hour upon hour of anchor and “expert” speculation. We know this because within a few days a Google search for “Aurora movie shootings” produced over 200 million hits referencing the massacre that left 70-plus casualties, including 12 fatalities.

We know a lot less about Anaheim and the killing of Manuel Angel Diaz, shot in the back and in the head by that city’s police just a few short hours after the awful Aurora murders.

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I'm perhaps not the only person who was aghast by the number and intensity of responses declaring the problem with Aurora was that not enough citizens were armed. There is a race to come up with the most far-fetched things to blame -- anything, essentially, besides the ease of purchasing firearms and a system that doesn't provide for the mentally ill.

Even Mitt Romney has gone on the record saying he doesn't think gun laws had anything to do with the tragedy -- even though the alleged perpetrator easily purchased 6,000 rounds of ammunition and deadly weapons with complete legal immunity.

Without further ado, here are the six worst reactions I found (with a few retractions and clarifications included):

1. Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert says the attack is the result of an attack on Judeo-Christian beliefs, and that the killings might have been avoided if the country returned to the ways of God.

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She got little response until the following day when Jezebel published a post titled, “Disturbing: Women on Twitter Think James Holmes Is ‘Hot,’ ‘Sexy,’ ‘Cute.” Her tweet, along with 10 others, was screen-capped alongside the piece, which detailed the many serial killers who have attracted female fans. Then came the threatening tweets, emails and phone calls, she says. "I've received hateful tweets ranging from 'You should be ashamed of yourself' to "You should get sterilized' to 'I hope someone kills your family to see if you'd still think he is cute.'" Someone called her house just to tell her "that they knew where I lived," she says.

"Sarah," who spoke to me on the condition that I leave her real name, Twitter handle and tweet out of this article, describes the past 24 hours as the worst of her life.

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It is, of course, possible that LaPierre, along with other top NRA executives (who are paid anywhere from $250,000 to more than $1 million a year), and the organization's 76 directors and 29 lobbyists believe that they contribute enough just working to convince the rest of their 4 million members to donate to the NRA. But the facts suggest rather that NRA officials are fully aware not only that what they're saying about Obama and the 2012 election is absurd but that much of what they're telling their members on a day-to-day basis is unadulterated nonsense.

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