Trial begins in Colorado over shooter’s mental health…

BOULDER, Colo. (AP) — The man who shot and killed 10 people in a mass shooting at a supermarket wasn’t crazy when he unleashed terror on a Colorado college town, but he was a calculated killer who knew what he was doing was wrong, a prosecutor told jurors Thursday in an opening statement that the defense quickly challenged.

Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa’s trial has begun after years of legal wrangling about his mental state on the day of the March 2021 Boulder shooting and will likely focus on determining whether he was sane.

Alissa’s attorney argued that his client, who has been diagnosed with treatment-resistant schizophrenia, suffered from hallucinations — hearing screaming voices, seeing people who weren’t there and believing someone was following him — in the lead-up to the 2021 King Soopers grocery store shooting.

Alissa has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. No one, including Alissa’s lawyers, disputes that he was the shooter.

“We’re not running away from this. But if you’re going to point a finger at this guy, you deserve to hear the truth about him. This man, Ahmad Alissa, is a sick man,” his lawyer, Samuel Dunn, said in his opening statement.

The prosecutor argued that Alissa was able to distinguish right from wrong and was therefore sane.

“The victims were random, but the murders were completely intentional and premeditated,” Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty told the jury.

Alissa, wearing a white striped shirt, sat next to her lawyers in the courtroom, occasionally turning in her chair to look at a video screen where the lawyers presented evidence and key arguments.

Relatives of the victims lined the rows on the opposite side of the hall, occasionally wiping their eyes and comforting each other during the speeches.

Alissa has been charged with 10 counts of murder, 15 attempted murders and other crimes in connection with the shooting in Boulder, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) northwest of Denver.

Alissa’s motive, if any, remained unclear, and Dougherty did not state one. He argued that Alissa acted with intent and full knowledge of what she was doing.

Most of the people shot inside and outside the store died within a little more than a minute. Alissa targeted people trying to escape — and took special care to finish off the wounded with additional shots, Dougherty noted.

“The shooter was preparing to kill them, he planned to kill them, he went and killed 10 people at King Soopers. That’s why you’re here,” Dougherty told jurors after showing photos of each victim and describing why each was at the store that day.

No one who was shot survived. After shooting eight people, Alissa walked through the store — silently, except for the background music that was still playing over the store’s speakers — and then spotted and killed Suzanne Fountain, 59, as she emerged from a hiding place in another aisle.

His final victim was Boulder police officer Eric Talley, a father of seven and one of the first three officers to enter the store.

Alissa surrendered to other officers who arrived at the scene. She voluntarily stripped down to her underwear and complied with their orders. When they approached and handcuffed him, the man handcuffed her.

“There are no hallucinations, no delusions, no disorientation,” Dougherty said of Alissa’s behavior.

Alissa’s attorney described a series of hallucinations, delusions and social withdrawal that relatives said Alissa experienced before the shooting, which psychiatrists later confirmed.

The schizophrenia was so severe that it took years before he began going to therapy and only then was he prescribed a drug, clozapine, which Dunn emphasized is only used when other treatments have failed.

Before the shooting, Alissa had not received medical treatment because she was from a family of Syrian immigrants, Dunn said. Her father believed the tragedy was caused by possession by an evil spirit, a genie.

“I want you to imagine that between your ears, where you have no shelter, no respite, you can’t identify the source: all you hear is screams and shouts,” Dunn said. “That’s what was being transmitted in Ahmad Alissa’s mind.”

Once, Alissa’s father woke up at 3 a.m. and his son, who was also awake, asked if he had seen a man in the bathroom. The father looked and there was no one there, Dunn said.

Dunn described testimony from relatives who said Alissa was emotionally withdrawn and spoke only when asked to before the shooting.

“The law says you can have intent and be insane. But the law doesn’t allow you to ignore the obvious, clear evidence of someone’s severe and chronic mental illness and say that person is of sound mind, that they can tell right from wrong,” Dunn said.

He told jurors to use “common sense, apply the law” and find Alissa insane.

If Alissa’s not guilty plea by reason of insanity is successful, he could avoid prison and be committed indefinitely to a state psychiatric hospital.

A mental health examiner testified at his 2022 legal capacity hearing that Alissa said he bought the firearm to carry out a mass shooting and suggested he wanted police to kill him.

The defense argued in court documents that relatives said the defendant irrationally believed the FBI was following him and talked to himself as if he was talking to someone who wasn’t there.

___

Gruver reported from Cheyenne, Wyoming.