Defense lawyers for James Holmes, who killed 12 people and wounded 58 in a mass shooting at a movie theater last year in Aurora, Colorado, continued their assault on the state's death penalty and said the former student of the University of Colorado (CU) is "too mentally ill for execution, local media reported Saturday.

"If not for his severe and chronic mental illness (Holmes) would not have committed the crime," defense lawyers said on Friday.

Holmes, 25, a former CU Neuroscience Ph.D. candidate, has pleaded "not guilty by reason of insanity" to the July 20 shooting massacre last year.

In a flurry of activity Friday, the court released 20 actions to the public. Most dealt with defense motions challenging the state's existing death penalty laws, including arguments calling the law unconstitutional and its language "arbitrary and vague."

A significant order signed Friday by presiding Judge Carlos A. Samour Jr. was a 44-page ruling that favored the prosecution by justifying the "warrantless search of (Holmes') apartment...under the claim of emergency exception."

This ruling addressed one of several claims by the defense that Holmes' rights were violated in the "chaos" on the night of the shooting.

According to defense motions, police moved quickly and without proper protocol that night, including the search of Holmes' nearby apartment they were told by the suspect was booby-trapped.

Prosecutors cited public safety concerns and the "involvement of explosives" and said obtaining a search warrant that night was "foolhardy" due to "unreasonable delays." The judge agreed.

The results of a state-mandated psychiatric examination of Holmes conducted over the summer in Pueblo has yet to be released, and is considered critical to determining his sanity.

Holmes'lawyers also noted that the prosecution's pursuit of the death penalty, based on the evidence, was "neither wise nor necessary" and could have been avoided by accepting a Holmes' guilty plea in exchange for life imprisonment without parole.

"This case is undeniably tragic and has caused suffering and trauma on a scale that is unprecedented in Colorado," Holmes' defense team wrote.

In December, attorneys in the case will argue about whether crime scene reconstruction evidence can be allowed at trial and about the constitutionality of the death penalty in Colorado.

The trial is set to begin in February.