TUCSON — Jared L. Loughner pleaded guilty on Tuesday to carrying out a shooting rampage here last year that left six people dead and 13 others wounded, including Gabrielle Giffords, then a member of the House of Representatives. For the crimes he committed, he received an automatic sentence of life in prison.
Mr. Loughner’s plea came soon after Judge Larry A. Burns found him mentally competent to admit to the crimes.
Under the terms of the deal brokered by his defense team and the prosecution, he would spend the rest of his life in prison, and be spared from a possible death sentence. The deal also means that victims’ relatives and the shooting’s survivors will not have to endure the prospect of sitting through a lengthy trial of uncertain outcome.
In a statement, Ms. Giffords’s husband, Mark E. Kelly, said they had been in contact with the United States attorney’s office as the negotiations over Mr. Loughner’s plea evolved.
“The pain and loss” caused by the rampage “are incalculable,” Mr. Kelly said. “Avoiding a trial will allow us — and we hope the whole Southern Arizona community — to continue with our recovery and move forward with our lives.”
The volatility of Mr. Loughner’s mental state was a deciding factor in the agreement. On May 25, 2011, he delivered an angry, incoherent rant in court just before Judge Burns ruled him incompetent to stand trial, halting the legal proceedings. Several months later, Mr. Loughner returned to court and sat for seven hours, silent and expressionless, seemingly under the effect of the psychotropic drugs he had been compelled to take.
For prosecutors, pushing for a trial carried clear risks, legal experts said. Mr. Loughner could have exploded at any moment, or jurors could have been swayed by the defense’s arguments and found him not guilty by reason of insanity.
Mr. Loughner faced 49 criminal charges, including first-degree murder, in the shootings on Jan. 8, 2011, outside a supermarket where Ms. Giffords was meeting with constituents. A 9-year-old girl, Christina-Taylor Green, and a federal judge, John Roll, were among the people killed.
Mr. Loughner arrived here on Monday from a psychiatric hospital in Springfield, Mo. — where he has been held for more than a year — and spent the night at a medium-security federal prison before his hearing on Tuesday.
Mr. Loughner’s plea came soon after Judge Larry A. Burns found him mentally competent to admit to the crimes.
Under the terms of the deal brokered by his defense team and the prosecution, he would spend the rest of his life in prison, and be spared from a possible death sentence. The deal also means that victims’ relatives and the shooting’s survivors will not have to endure the prospect of sitting through a lengthy trial of uncertain outcome.
In a statement, Ms. Giffords’s husband, Mark E. Kelly, said they had been in contact with the United States attorney’s office as the negotiations over Mr. Loughner’s plea evolved.
“The pain and loss” caused by the rampage “are incalculable,” Mr. Kelly said. “Avoiding a trial will allow us — and we hope the whole Southern Arizona community — to continue with our recovery and move forward with our lives.”
The volatility of Mr. Loughner’s mental state was a deciding factor in the agreement. On May 25, 2011, he delivered an angry, incoherent rant in court just before Judge Burns ruled him incompetent to stand trial, halting the legal proceedings. Several months later, Mr. Loughner returned to court and sat for seven hours, silent and expressionless, seemingly under the effect of the psychotropic drugs he had been compelled to take.
For prosecutors, pushing for a trial carried clear risks, legal experts said. Mr. Loughner could have exploded at any moment, or jurors could have been swayed by the defense’s arguments and found him not guilty by reason of insanity.
Mr. Loughner faced 49 criminal charges, including first-degree murder, in the shootings on Jan. 8, 2011, outside a supermarket where Ms. Giffords was meeting with constituents. A 9-year-old girl, Christina-Taylor Green, and a federal judge, John Roll, were among the people killed.
Mr. Loughner arrived here on Monday from a psychiatric hospital in Springfield, Mo. — where he has been held for more than a year — and spent the night at a medium-security federal prison before his hearing on Tuesday.