The official story is that a local University of Colorado student James Eagan Holmes purchased a ticket to the 12:05 am showing, sat in the front row of the theater 9 and then about 20 minutes into the movie left through an emergency door to the rear of the theater where his car was parked out back. He then is said to have donned protective gear and loaded up with weapons, then returned to the theater through the same door ten minutes later at approximately 12:30 am, tossed a couple of cans of gas into the crowd and began shooting.