The Colorado shooting reignited debate over gun control in the States after it emerged that suspect James Holmes was able to legally obtain four weapons and more than 6,000 rounds of ammunition in the weeks leading up to the massacre.
US President Barack Obama talking on the phone with the Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan
"All the weapons that he possessed, he possessed legally," Aurora police chief Dan Oates said of the AR-15 assault rifle, two Glock pistols and high-powered shotgun recovered after the attack that killed 12 people and injured 58 others. "And all the ammunition that he possessed, he possessed legally."
The firearms were purchased from local gun stores within the last two months, Oates said, which, under Colorado state laws, perform only cursory background checks on customers. As Holmes had no previous convictions, he was able to amass his deadly arsenal without raising "red flags". The ammunition was purchased online.
In the aftermath of the tragedy, New York's mayor Michael Bloomberg challenged presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney to address the contentious issue of gun control.
"Soothing words are nice," said Bloomberg. "But maybe it's time the two people who want to be president of the United States stand up and tell us what they're going to do about it, because this is obviously a problem across the country."
Both candidates remained silent on the issue, however, wary of challenging the Second Amendment "right to bear arms" and alienating the powerful pro-firearm electorate.
A spokesman for the National Rifle Association – which is spending $40 million (£26 million) in a bid to defeat Obama's campaign for re-election – refused to comment on the shootings "until all the facts are known".
More voters want their rights to gun ownership protected than would back stricter gun controls, according to recent polling, although among independent voters the split in an April poll by the Pew Research Centre was 55 to 40 per cent the other way.
Al Gore's support of tighter firearm legislation, after the 1999 Columbine High School massacre, is believed to have cost him support in key rural states, and ultimately the 2000 election.
A 1994 law to ban assault weapons, such as the AR-15 rifle that Holmes used to such deadly effect, expired and was not renewed due to pressure from pro-gun lobbyists.
As governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney backed a ban on assault weapons, but in April he reassured the National Rifle Association that he would not implement any new nationwide gun laws if elected president.
Representative Carolyn McCarthy, whose husband was killed and son seriously injured in a 1993 shooting in Long Island, New York, said that the pro-firearm bodies employ a strategy following incidents such as the Aurora shooting.
"They will wait it out, wait it out, wait it out, until people forget about it again, until another tragedy happens," said McCarthy. "We should be proactive before another tragedy happens".
Colin Goddard, who survived the Virginia Tech massacre that killed 32 people in 2007, urged the public to lobby for tighter gun controls in the wake of the Aurora tragedy. "The American people need to express their outrage directly to their Representatives", he said.
Some are using the cinema massacre to argue for strengthening of gun owners' rights, however "If ONE person inside that theater was armed, this situation would NOT have been as bad as it is," said Colorado Representative Ed Perlmutter on his Facebook page.
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