Judge wants trial in baby killing before year ends

BRUNSWICK, Ga. (AP) — A judge said Friday he wants a trial before the end of the year for a teenager charged with fatally shooting a 13-month-old baby in the face during a street robbery two weeks ago.

Glynn County Superior Court Judge Stephen Kelley didn't give a tentative trial date for 17-year-old De'Marquis Elkins. District Attorney Jackie Johnson told the judge she thought investigators would have evidence ready to share with Elkins' defense lawyers next month. The judge scheduled the suspect's next hearing for May 24.

"I do expect we will try this case by the end of this year," Kelley told the attorneys at the end of a bond hearing Friday morning.

The judge denied Elkins' request for bond, saying he was concerned the suspect might flee if he was released.

Elkins faces life in prison if convicted of malice murder in the March 21 slaying of Antonio Santiago. Police say the boy was shot in a robbery attempt. His mother, Sherry West, has said she was pushing her son in his stroller a few blocks from her apartment when two youths approached asking for money. When she refused, she said, one of them drew a gun and shot her in the leg before shooting her baby in the face.

An indictment last week identified Elkins as the person who pulled the trigger. Another teenager, 15-year-old Dominique Lang, has been charged with murder as an accomplice.

"Mr. Elkins is certainly disappointed with the decision" to deny him bond, said Kevin Gough, the suspect's defense attorney. "But he is also every encouraged by the speedy trial schedule the court is considering."

Gough had urged the judge to consider bond for Elkins based on his lack of any prior felony record, though Elkins pleaded guilty last year to misdemeanor charges of marijuana possession and giving a false name to a police officer.

The suspect's 78-year-old great grandfather, McKinley Elkins Jr., took the witness stand and promised the judge he would personally look after his great grandson if he was released from jail pending trial.

"I truly believe, deep down in my heart, that he will be a gentleman from this day forward," the elder Elkins said.

But just how well the great grandfather knew Elkins was called into question when he was unable to tell District Attorney Jackie Johnson where the teenager went to school, whether he had any tattoos, or even where he lived.

Roderic Nohilly, a Glynn County police detective, told the judge Elkins had several tattoos — a teardrop by his right eye, his mother's name on his right arm, a skull on his abdomen and the words "Thug Life" across his chest.

Nohilly said Elkins' tattoos contained symbols affiliated with gangs. Gough argued that Elkins' tattoos aren't proof that he's a gang member and said it's unlikely Elkins even knows what the symbols are supposed to mean.

"Are you familiar with the word 'poser,'" Gough asked the detective. "There are quite a few young men who run around town trying to pretend they're something they are not, aren't there?"

Police: Beer, medication found in Holmes apartment

CENTENNIAL, Colo. (AP) — Newly unsealed court records show that police found lots of beer, a Batman mask and drugs used to treat depression and anxiety in James Holmes' apartment after theColorado theater shooting.

The records released Thursday show that police found more than 50 cans and bottles of beer, a Batman mask, paper shooting targets and the medication in the apartment in Aurora. Police detailed more than 100 items found there.

Authorities searched the apartment after disarming booby-traps Holmes allegedly left there.

Holmes faces the death penalty if convicted of killing 12 people during the attack. His attorneys have said he was mentally ill.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

A psychiatrist who treated James Holmes told campus police a month before the Colorado theater attack that Holmes had homicidal thoughts and was a danger to the public, according to documents released Thursday.

Dr. Lynne Fenton, a psychiatrist at the University of Colorado, Denver, told police in June that the shooting suspect also threatened and intimidated her. It was more than a month before the July 20 attack at a movie theater that killed 12 and injured 70.

In the days after the attack, campus police said they had never had contact with Holmes, who was a graduate student at the university.

But campus police Officer Lynn Whitten told investigators after the shooting that Fenton had contacted her. Whitten said Fenton was following her legal requirement to report threats to authorities, according to a search warrant affidavit.

"Dr. Fenton advised that through her contact with James Holmes she was reporting, per her requirement, his danger to the public due to homicidal statements he had made," the affidavit said.

Whitten added that Fenton said she began to receive threatening text messages from Holmes after he stopped seeing her for counseling, the documents said.

Whitten did not immediately respond to messages left at her home and office. University spokeswoman Jacque Montgomery said she could not comment because the school had not reviewed the court records.

The documents previously were sealed, but the new judge overseeing the case ordered them released Thursday after requests from media organizations including The Associated Press.

Holmes last week offered to plead guilty in the attacks. Prosecutors rejected that offer and announced Monday they would seek the death penalty.

The document that includes the information on the psychiatrist was filed to obtain the contents of a package Holmes sent to her before the attack. That package included a notebook that the newly released documents describe as like a "journal."

The package was dated July 12 — eight days before the massacre — but was found four days after the attack, in the university mail room. It included a sticky note with an "infinity design" and burnt $20 bills.

In court, prosecutors suggested Holmes was angry at the failure of a once promising academic career, and had stockpiled weapons, ammunition, tear gas grenades and body armor as his research deteriorated and professors urged him to get into another profession. Chief Deputy District Attorney Karen Pearson said Holmes failed a key oral exam in June, was banned from campus and began to voluntarily withdraw from the school.

The newly released records describe Holmes' behavior after police found him, still clad in ballistic gear, leaving the theater after the massacre. After he was arrested, one officer asked Holmes if anyone was with him.

Holmes replied: "It's just me."

He also warned detectives that he had booby-trapped his apartment. It took days before authorities could disarm the traps and enter Holmes' apartment. When police took Holmes to the station and told him of his rights to an attorney, he asked for one, according to court records. That ended their interview with him.

The documents — including arrest and search warrant affidavits — were unsealed by the new judge in the case. District Judge Carlos Samour took over this week after the previous judge, who had sealed the documents, removed himself.

Judge William Sylvester handed off to Samour on Monday, saying prosecutors' decision to seek the death penalty against Holmes meant the case would take up so much time that he couldn't carry out his administrative duties as chief judge of a busy four-county district.

Both prosecutors and defense attorneys had raised concerns about releasing the documents. Prosecutors said they were worried about the privacy of victims and witnesses if the records were released. Attorneys for Holmes said they didn't want to hurt his chances for a fair trial.

Sylvester had said he was reluctant to release the documents before the preliminary hearing, when prosecutors laid out evidence on whether Holmes could be brought to trial. That hearing was held in January, with investigators giving the names and injuries of every theater victim in graphic detail.

Witnesses testified that Holmes spent weeks amassing an arsenal and planning the attack. They said he set up an elaborate booby trap in his apartment designed to explode at the same time as the theater attack occurred miles away.

Media organizations said there has been a "wealth of information already made public in the proceedings thus far." They argued there was no basis for the documents to remain sealed.

After the preliminary hearing, Samour said lawyers failed to show that releasing the records would cause any harm, or that keeping the documents sealed would prevent any harm.

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School faces new questions in Colorado massacre

FILE - In this March 12, 2013 file photo, James Holmes, left, and defense attorney Tamara Brady appear in district court in Centennial, Colo. for his arraignment. Court documents are raising new questions for the university that Colorado theater shooting suspect James Holmes attended before the July 20 theater shooting that left 12 people dead and 70 injured. (AP Photo/The Denver Post, RJ Sangosti, Pool, File)

CENTENNIAL, Colo. (AP) — New questions confronted the University of Colorado, Denver on Friday amid disclosures that a psychiatrist who treated theater shooting suspect James Holmeshad warned campus police a month before the deadly assault that Holmes was dangerous and had homicidal thoughts.

Court documents made public Thursday revealed Dr. Lynne Fentonalso told a campus police officer in June that the shooting suspect had threatened and intimidated her.

Fenton's blunt warning came more than a month before the July 20 attack at a movie theater that killed 12 and injured 70. Holmes had been a student in the university's Ph.D. neuroscience program but withdrew about six weeks before the shootings after failing a key examination.

Campus police officer Lynn Whitten told investigators after the shooting that Fenton had contacted her. Whitten said Fenton was following her legal requirement to report threats to authorities, according one of the documents, a search warrant affidavit.

"Dr. Fenton advised that through her contact with James Holmes she was reporting, per her requirement, his danger to the public due to homicidal statements he had made," the affidavit said.

Whitten added that Fenton said she began to receive threatening text messages from Holmes after he stopped seeing her for counseling, the documents said.

It was not clear if Fenton's concerns about Holmes reached other university officials. Whitten told investigators she deactivated Holmes' access card after hearing from Fenton, but the affidavit did not say what other action she took.

Neither Whitten nor Fenton immediately responded to telephone messages Friday.

The university released a statement Friday saying the documents supported its assertions in August that Holmes' access card was deactivated when he quit a doctoral program but that he was not banned from campus.

The statement did not address whether the university took any steps in response to Fenton's warning that he was a threat to the public.

It also didn't directly address the university police officer's statement that she deactivated Holmes' access card because of Fenton's concerns.

Ken McConnellogue, a spokesman for the University of Colorado System and its governing Board of Regents, said Friday the university stands by its statement that Holmes' card was canceled "as he withdrew from school."

"We can't comment on what was said in a police report," McConnellogue said.

Nicholus Palmer, an attorney for the widow of one of the people slain in the attack, said it's still unclear how much school officials knew about Holmes before the shootings.

"But from what's come out, there's clearly knowledge that this guy was dangerous," he said. Palmer's client is suing the university and Fenton.

The indication that a psychiatrist had called Holmes a danger to the public gave momentum to Democratic state lawmakers' plans to introduce legislation to further restrict mentally ill people from buying guns. State Rep. Beth McCann initially cited the information Thursday as a reason she would introduce a bill as soon as Friday, but quickly backed off and said no date has been set.

The theater massacre already helped inspire a new state ban on large-capacity firearm magazines.

In the days after the attack, university officials released little information about Holmes or how it responded to concerns about him. University officials cited both a gag order in the criminal case and federal privacy laws.

"To the best of our knowledge at this point, we think we did everything that we should have done," university Chancellor Don Elliman said three days after the attack.

Campus police also said they had never had contact with Holmes. University officials acknowledged a criminal background check had been run on Holmes, but the person who requested the background check has not been publicly identified.

The documents released Thursday were previously sealed, but the new judge overseeing the case ordered them released after requests from news organizations including The Associated Press.

District Judge Carlos Samour took over this week after the previous judge, who had sealed the documents, removed himself. Judge William Sylvester handed off to Samour on Monday, saying the case would take up so much time that he couldn't carry out his administrative duties as chief judge of a four-county district.

Sylvester entered a plea of not guilty on Holmes' behalf. Defense lawyers revealed last week that Holmes had offered to plead guilty, but prosecutors rejected the offer and announced Monday they would seek the death penalty.

The newly released records also showed that police collected more than 100 items of evidence from Holmes' apartment, including 50 cans and bottles of beer, a Batman mask, paper shooting targets and prescription medications to treat anxiety and depression. His attorneys have said he is mentally ill.

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Associated Press writer Catherine Tsai in Denver contributed to this report.

Is the U.S. headed for fiscal collapse?

According to David Stockman, the U.S. economy is doomed and the government is to blame

The U.S. economy is doomed, says David Stockman in The New York Times, and the government is to blame. "We've had eight decades of increasingly frenetic fiscal and monetary policyactivism intended to counter the cyclical bumps and grinds of the free market," and where has it left us? With a bogus economy propped up by massive debt and government money-printing, and headed toward another economic collapse. After the last bubble burst in 2008, the administrations of Presidents Bush and Obama, along with Congress and the Fed, have "made a series of desperate, reckless maneuvers that were not only unnecessary but ruinous." The entire economic "recovery'' has been fueled by the Fed's "radical spree of money-printing," which is "inflating yet another unsustainable bubble." As I argue in my new book, The Great Deformation, America's economic decline was sealed in 1933, when Franklin D. Roosevelt took the dollar off the gold standard and "opted for fiat money." Subsequent decades of Keynesian economics and loose monetary policy has left us $17 trillion in debt, and on a trajectory toward $30 trillion in debt within a decade. "When the latest bubble pops, there will be nothing to stop the collapse. If this sounds like advice to get out of the markets and hide out in cash, it is."

Stockman's "spittle-filled diatribe" can be reduced to one nihilistic tenet, says Neil Irwin in TheWashington Post. He believes any government action leads us astray from "perfect state-of-nature capitalism." But in fact capitalism "can only exist in a framework" that is set up by government. We can disagree about "how interventionist that government or its monetary authority should be." But it's absurd to insist that "anything the state does to try to fix things is undermining some elegant capitalist order and will inevitably lead to chaos."

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"It's hard to know where to begin poking holes in this," says Joe Weisenthal at Business Insider. But blaming FDR's decision to take the U.S. off the gold standard is as good a place as any. The truth is that the past 80 years "have represented a marvelous time for economic progress in America." The standard of living has vastly improved, and "the tools of modern economic management have meant that we've never had another economic crash anywhere near the level we saw during the Great Depression." The past few years alone "have been devastating" to Stockman's theory. The dollar hasn't collapsed, inflation hasn't soared, housing is recovering, and borrowing costs are not exploding. Chicken Littles like Stockman have been predicting doom for years, "and the market consistently rejects them."

Stockman's argument is nothing more than "cranky old man stuff," says Paul Krugman at The New York Times. It's the same sort of gold-bug, free-market absolutist demagoguery you get fromInvestor's Business Daily and Rush Limbaugh. Our $16 trillion economy can easily handle current budget deficits, which are now declining steeply. And after the 2008 recession, "running deficits was appropriate'' to stimulate economic growth. "Anyone who says differently hasn't done his homework."

SEE MORE: 17 offbeat holidays you can celebrate in April

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Argentine politicians jeered as flood toll hits 57

Argentina's politicians booed as death toll from torrential rains and floods rises to 57

Associated Press -

LA PLATA, Argentina (AP) -- Argentine police and soldiers searched house to house, in creeks and culverts and even in trees for bodies on Thursday after floods killed at least 57 people in the province and city of Buenos Aires.

As torrential rains stopped and the waters receded, the crisis shifted to guaranteeing public health and safety in this provincial capital of nearly 1 million people. Safe drinking water was in short supply, and more than a quarter-million people were without power, although authorities said most would get their lights back on overnight.

Many people barely escaped with their lives after seeing everything they own disappear under water reeking with sewage and fuel that rose more than six feet (nearly two meters) high inside some homes. The wreckage was overwhelming: piles of broken furniture, overturned cars, ruined food and other debris.

Their frustration was uncontainable as politicians arrived making promises. President Cristina Fernandez, Gov. Daniel Scioli, Social Welfare Minister Alicia Kirchner and the mayors of Buenos Aires and La Plata were all booed when they tried to talk with victims. Many yelled "go away" and "you came too late."

"I understand you, I understand you're angry," Kirchner said before she and the governor fled in their motorcade from an angry crowd.

"There is no water, there is no electricity. We have nothing," said Nelly Cerrado, who was looking for donated clothing at a local school. "Terrible, terrible what we are going through. And no one comes. No one. Because here, it is neighbors who have to do everything."

The nearby Ensenada refinery, Argentina's largest, remained offline after flooding caused a fire that took hours to quench in the middle of the rainstorm, the state-run YPF oil company said. YPF said it would take them 36 more hours just to drain excess water from the damaged refinery, and at least another seven days before the refinery can renew operations. The company also said it was putting into place an emergency plan to guarantee gasoline supplies, and would invest $800 million to replace a damaged coking unit where the flood caused a fire with a newer, higher-capacity unit.

Scioli said the death toll had risen to 51 people in and around La Plata, following six deaths in the national capital from flooding two days earlier. But he said nearly all of the missing had been accounted for.

The victims included a member of the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo human rights group, Lucila Ahumada de Inama, who was found under nearly six feet (about 1.7 meters) of water inside her home. She died without having found her grandson, born in captivity after her pregnant daughter-in-law was kidnapped by Argentina's dictatorship in 1977.

Some flooded residents were being lauded as heroes. Alejandro Fernandez, a 44-year-old policeman who was off-duty when the rains started, pulled out his rubber boat and shuttled about 100 neighbors to higher ground. His neighbor, Dr. Jose Alberto Avelar, turned his home into a clinic, treating dozens for hypothermia.

Fernandez "won't say it because he's too humble, but what he did was incredible," Avelar said. "His action got everyone else helping as well."

A store and an elementary school were looted, but police and troops were helping residents guard neighborhoods to prevent more crimes. In addition to 750 provincial police officers, the national government sent in army, coast guard, police and social welfare workers.

Mobile hospitals were activated after two major hospitals were flooded, and government workers were handing out donated water, canned food and clothing. Provincial Health Minister Alejandro Collia said hepatitis shots were being given at 33 evacuation centers, and that spraying would kill mosquitoes that spread dengue fever.

"The humanitarian question comes first. The material questions will be resolved in time," said Scioli, who promised subsidies, loans and tax exemptions for the victims.

Scioli also thanked Pope Francis for sending a message of support. The governor said "this has to give us all the strength to accompany these families."

Argentina's weather service had warned of severe thunderstorms, but nothing like rainfall that fell this week.

More than 16 inches (400 millimeters) drenched La Plata in just a few hours late Tuesday and early Wednesday — more than has ever been recorded there for the entire month of April.

In both Buenos Aires and La Plata, sewage and storm drain systems were overwhelmed, and low-lying neighborhoods looked something like New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, with all but the upper parts of houses under water.

And in both cities, politicians sought to fix blame on their rivals as residents complained that government in general was ill-prepared and providing insufficient help.

It didn't help that the mayors of both cities were vacationing in Brazil when disaster struck.

Buenos Aires Mayor Mauricio Macri said Fernandez needs to foster expensive public works projects to cope with storms that will become more frequent due to climate change.

La Plata Mayor Pablo Bruera, meanwhile, arrived home to an additional, self-inflicted disaster: While he was in Brazil, a tweet sent from his official Twitter account falsely claimed he had been "checking on evacuation centers since last night." The tweet even included an old picture of Bruera handing out bottled water.

Bruera told reporters Thursday that he would not resign over the false claim, and that he had instead fired the people responsible for what he called a "mistake by my communications team."

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