Melisa Cowden, the mother of a cadet whose father was shot during a midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises, issued a statement earlier this week in response to a New York Times article that shed light on the suspension of Gregory Sullivan, a tenured humanities teacher.
“We are sad to see the public humiliation by the media and public reprimanding the professor at the USMMA is receiving for his distasteful joke,” she said before adding that her and other families impacted by the tragedy have already endured enough pain.
Last Wednesday the Times reported that, prior to showing a documentary during class, Sullivan told students, “If someone with orange hair appears in the corner of the room, run for the exit,” a reference to the 20 July incident in which the alleged attacker, James Holmes, had orange hair.
