A top Palace official yesterday cited the need for a review of existing security policies in the densely populated facilities like commercial centers, malls, arcades and cinemas in the wake of the shooting rampage inside a movie house in Aurora, Colorado, USA where at least 12 people were killed and 58 others wounded.
President Aquino issued a  strongly worded statement condemning the shooting spree which he described as another instance of senseless violence.
The violence which saw a 24-year-old American psychotic indiscriminately shooting at the filmgoers instantly killed 12 people, while wounding 58 others, including a 17-year-old Filipino-American identified as Ryan Lumba.
At a radio press briefing, Aquino’s spokesman Edwin Lacierda  conveyed a President’s wish for the immediate recovery of Lumba who latest news reports said was already out of danger after sustaining a gunshot wound in the abdomen.
Lacierda, however, would not utter any nasty word on the 24-year-old American gunman James Holmes who went on a shooting spree inside a cinema that was showing the advance screening of the latest Batman flick.
“We hope and pray for his recovery,” Lacierda said of Lumba.
The Palace mouthpiece said the incident should at least serve as a wake-up call for the local cinema operators on the need to beef up security measures even as he asked mall operators in the country to be vigilant and alert.
The cinema was showing the latest Batman film The Dark Knight Rises when Holmes sneaked into the movie hall using the emergency exit, then fired at will at the moviegoers.
Holmes, who was found to have a history of psychiatric impairment, was arrested immediately after the rampage.