After all 165 guilty verdicts were read and Colorado's movie massacre gunman was taken back to a cell to await his fate on Thursday, many of his victims smiled and hugged and said James Holmes must be executed for justice to be done.
Survivors and their loved ones gathered outside the rain-swept courthouse in the evening after Holmes was convicted of killing 12 people and wounding 70 inside a Denver-area theater. The third anniversary of the rampage will be this Monday.
"As soon as we heard the first 'guilty,' we knew the other dominoes were going to fall," said Tom Sullivan, 60. His son Alex, called "Sully" by his friends and co-workers, had been celebrating his 27th birthday with friends at the cinema when Holmes killed him and the others in a hail of bullets.