Colorado Judge Warned Gay-Bar Shooter Was Planning Mass-Shooting Last Year - Yahoo News

Last year, a Colorado judge dismissed a case against Anderson Lee Aldrich, the shooter who killed five people in a Colorado gay bar last month, despite being alerted that the perpetrator was stockpiling firearms and other weapons.

The 2021 kidnapping case was resolved when a SWAT team was called to Aldrich’s grandparent’s house in response to a bomb threat. According to an El Paso County press release, Aldrich was threatening to use “a homemade bomb” prompting police to evacuate nearby houses and send out an emergency text for residents within a quarter-mile radius.

The situation was ultimately diffused and Aldrich was taken into custody. Law enforcement discovered more than 100 pounds of explosives, guns, and ammo at the time ABC reports.

Despite being charged with two counts of felony menacing and three counts of first-degree kidnapping, the judge inexplicably dismissed the case despite acknowledging Aldrich was a danger to the public.

“You clearly have been planning for something else,” the presiding judge Robin Chittum said during the trial. “It didn’t have to do with your grandma and grandpa. It was saving all these firearms and trying to make this bomb, and making statements about other people being involved in some sort of shootout and a huge thing. And then that’s kind of what it turned into,” the judge said, according to transcripts obtained by the Associated Press.

Judge Chittum’s concerns were echoed by family members who testified that they believed Aldrich was dangerous.

Relatives of Aldrich warned during the 2021 trial “it’s going to be so bad” if his ongoing mental-health struggles were not adequately addressed. In particular, his grandparents warned the court that their grandson wanted to become a “mass killer” and “go out in a blaze,” ABC reports.

Certain family members, however, proved unreceptive to court subpoena requests making the case harder to prosecute. Nevertheless, the court transcripts also point to the judge’s tepidness in disciplining Aldrich.

“This was a potential crime that didn’t just solely impact the grandparents. This was a three-hour standoff. This was disruptive. The police were threatened,” law professor Jonathan Turley told ABC. Harvard’s Alan Dershowitz pointed to the case as an instance of “the legal system failing,” the AP reports.