The 24-year-old shooter who killed five people and wounded nearly two dozen others at an LGBTQ+ nightclub in Colorado Springs in 2022 pleaded guilty on Tuesday to 74 federal hate crimes and firearm charges.
The big picture: The agreement means federal prosecutors will not seek the death penalty for Anderson Lee Aldrich .
- U.S. District Judge Charlotte Sweeney accepted the plea deal, meaning Aldrich will serve "multiple concurrent life sentences plus additional consecutive sentences totaling 190 years imprisonment," court filings show .
- Sweeney made Aldrich admit the victims were murdered due to their sexual or gender identity, and noted that she deemed it appropriate to sentence Aldrich during Pride Month, the Denver Post reports .
What she's saying: "You went to this community's safe place and mass murdered people, but I hope what you learned today is this community is much stronger than you," Sweeney said before sentencing Aldrich, per the Post.
Zoom in: Last year, Aldrich was sentenced to five consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole after pleading guilty in state court and was sentenced to an additional 2,208 years in prison over attempted murder charges.
- At the time, Fourth Judicial District Attorney Michael Allen said it was the longest sentence ever achieved in the district and the second-longest sentence in state history after the Aurora theater shooting case.
Catch up quick: The shooting at Club Q occurred just before midnight on Nov. 19, 2022. Aldrich was subdued after being tackled by two patrons, including U.S. Army veteran Richard Fierro .
- Court filings revealed the shooter spent $9,000 on weapons-related purchases in the two years leading up the attack, per the Post .
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