Alleged Club Q shooter could face a dozen new charges atop 300-plus already filed
Jan. 9—Prosecutors filed a motion Monday to bring 12 additional charges against the alleged Club Q shooter.
Anderson Lee Aldrich, 22, already faces 305 criminal charges in the LGBTQ+ nightclub shooting that claimed five lives and injured nearly two dozen others.
Fourth Judicial District attorney Michael Allen proposed the new charges in connection with two victims who survived the attack. The amended charges include attempted murder, attempted assault and bias-motivated crime against each of the victims. The total charge count would rise to 317.
The original charges included 10 counts of first-degree murder, 86 counts of attempted first-degree murder and 48 counts of bias motivated crime.
Aldrich will be in court Wednesday for a motions hearing related to a bomb threat case in 2021 in which Aldrich allegedly threatened to detonate a bomb and told their grandparents that they wanted to be "the next mass shooter."
Aldrich has another motions hearing Friday over the Club Q shooting.
Aldrich's preliminary hearing is scheduled to begin Feb. 22. At that hearing, a judge will determine whether there is sufficient evidence for the defendant to stand trial.
One of Aldrich's defense attorneys, Joseph Archambault, objected in December to holding the preliminary hearing on that February date, saying he and his team would not be ready by then to properly represent Aldrich.
"We will not be ready. ... We will not be effective," Archambault told Judge Michael McHenry.
Despite the defense's objection, McHenry opted to schedule the first day of the preliminary hearing for Feb. 22. Allen said he anticipates the hearing will last two full days.
