Colorado L.G.B.T.Q. Club Shooter Pleads Guilty to Federal Hate Crimes

The shooter convicted of killing five people at a Colorado Springs L.G.B.T.Q. nightclub in 2022 pleaded guilty on Tuesday to federal hate crime and firearm violations. Under the agreement, federal prosecutors did not seek the death penalty for Anderson Lee Aldrich, 24, who is nonbinary and uses the pronouns they/them.

The Justice Department had announced a plea agreement with Mx. Aldrich in January, which included life in prison without the possibility of parole plus a consecutive sentence of 190 years in prison.

In federal court in Denver, U.S. District Judge Charlotte N. Sweeney said she would wait until she had heard from anyone who wanted to speak at the hearing before deciding whether to accept or reject the plea agreement. If the judge accepts the plea, Mx. Aldrich will be sentenced according to the agreement. If she does not accept the agreement, both parties could withdraw.

Last year, Mx. Aldrich pleaded guilty to dozens of state charges of murder and attempted murder, but pleaded no contest to hate crimes charges. At the hearing on Tuesday, prosecutors urged Judge Sweeney to accept the plea agreement to change that.

“This plea requires an admission of guilt, that these were hate crimes,” said Assistant U.S. attorney Alison M. Connaughty.

Just a few days before announcing the plea agreement with Mx. Aldrich, federal prosecutors said they would seek the death penalty for the 20-year-old man who killed 10 Black people at a supermarket in Buffalo in 2022. Dylann Roof, who killed nine Black worshipers at a church in Charleston in 2015, was the first person in the United States sentenced to death for a federal hate crime.