COLORADO – During a hearing on Wednesday, a police detective testified that Anderson Lee Aldrich, the 22-year-old accused of carrying out a mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Colorado Springs in November, ran a neo-Nazi website and used homophobic and racist language while gaming online.
The detective also revealed that Aldrich posted an image of a rifle scope aimed at a gay pride parade and used a homophobic slur. The prosecution is seeking to add hate crime charges to the existing murder and attempted murder charges.
The detective further testified that Aldrich, who identifies as nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, administered a website that included a “neo-Nazi white supremacist” shooting training video glorifying mass shootings. The video featured attacks on synagogues and mosques in Europe and the 2019 Christchurch shooting, which the detective believes Aldrich was attempting to emulate in the Colorado Springs shooting.
During the hearing, it was revealed that Aldrich’s mother, Laura Voepel, is also nonbinary and that Aldrich was ‘forced’ to go to the nightclub at least six times prior to the shooting, with no reported disturbances, the AP reported.
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The defense argued that Aldrich was not motivated by anti-LGBTQ bias, but rather by drug use, sleep deprivation, and a history of abuse.
The shooting was stopped when a Navy technician grabbed the barrel of Aldrich’s rifle, burning his hand in the process.
