Holmes' Mom: 'Loudest Cry for Help Was His Silence'

James Holmes' mother insisted today that she would "have been crawling on all fours" to reach him had she known he was talking about killing people weeks before he ambushed a crowded Colorado movie theater. Arlene Holmes said her son's campus psychiatrist never told her that James Holmes had homicidal thoughts when she called that June and revealed that he was quitting therapy and dropping out of school. "We wouldn't be sitting here if she had told me that!" Holmes' mother said, her sobs rising to anger. "She never said he was thinking of killing people. She didn't tell me. She didn't tell me. She didn't tell me!"

Earlier today, Holmes' father, Robert, said his son "was not a violent person. At least not until the event." The latter is a phrase he used several times to refer to his son's 2012 attack that killed 12 people and injured 70 others. In their testimony, his parents said they'd been thrilled when he started dating in graduate school, and knew it wasn't a good sign when that first relationship ended. "We knew some things weren't going well there," Robert Holmes said. "He said he was having trouble in school," Arlene Holmes said, stifling a sob. "I kept telling him, just keep trying, keep trying, but I didn't realize that his loudest cry for help was his silence." (Robert Holmes detailed his son's normal childhood yesterday.)