Valeen Schnurr
Two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, embarked on a massacre, killing 12 students and a teacher, injured 21 others, while 3 were injured while attempting to escape, before committing suicide. It is the fourth-deadliest school massacre in United States history, after the 1927 Bath School disaster, 2007 Virginia Tech massacre and the 1966 University of Texas massacre, and the deadliest for an American high school.
The massacre provoked debate regarding gun control laws, the availability of firearms in the United States, and gun violence involving youths.
Much discussion also centered on the nature of high school cliques, subcultures and bullying, as well as the role of violent movies and video games in American society. The shooting also resulted in an increased emphasis on school security, and a moral panic aimed at goth culture, social outcasts, the gun culture, the use of pharmaceutical anti-depressants by teenagers, violent films and music, teenage internet use, and violent video games.
Preliminary activities and intent
Eric Harris (left) and Dylan Klebold (right)
Early warning signs began to surface in 1996, when Eric Harris first created a private website on America Online.
By the end of the year, the site contained instructions on how to cause mischief, as well as instructions on how to make explosives, and logs of the trouble he and Klebold were causing. Beginning in early 1997, the blog postings began to show the first signs of Harris's ever-growing anger against society.
Harris's site had few visitors, and it did not become an issue until late 1997, when Jefferson County Sheriff's Office investigator Michael Guerra was notified of the site after the parents of Harris's former friend, Brooks Brown, discovered that Harris was posting death threats aimed at their son. Guerra discovered the website also contained violent threats directed at the students and teachers of Columbine High School.
Other material included blurbs Harris had written concerning his hatred of society in general and his desire to kill those who annoyed him. As the date of the shooting neared, Harris also began noting the completion of pipe bombs on his site, as well as a gun count and hit list of individuals he wished to target, although it never mentioned his overall plot. As Harris had admitted to having explosives, Guerra decided to write a draft affidavit for a search warrant of the Harris household, but it was never filed.
On January 30, 1998, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were caught with tools that had been stolen, moments earlier, from a parked van near Littleton, Colorado. Both were arrested and attended a joint court hearing where they pleaded guilty to the theft.
The judge sentenced them to juvenile diversion where they attended various classes together, including a class on anger management. Harris also started attending therapy with a psychologist and continued to do so for about a year.
While in diversion, both adolescents attended mandated classes and met with parole officers.
They placed out of the substance abuse class, despite Klebold's history of drinking and a dilute urine test. Both Harris and Klebold were eventually released from diversion several weeks early due to their good behavior. Harris wrote an ingratiating letter to the owner of the equipment they stole, offering insincere apologies, and feigned empathy. During this time he would often boast in his journal entries about faking regret, and applauded himself at his deception. Harris continued under his psychologist's care until a few months before the attack, all while he and Klebold plotted; the pair felt as if they were at war against society and needed to take action towards those they hated.
Shortly after his and Klebold's court hearing, Harris's blog disappeared and his website was reverted to its original purpose of posting user-created levels for the game Doom. It was at this time that Harris began to write out his thoughts and plans in a paper journal.
Despite this, Harris still dedicated a section of his website to posting his progress on the collection of guns and the building of the bombs used in the attack. After its existence was made public, AOL permanently deleted the website from its servers.
Medication
After Harris complained of depression, anger, and suicidal thoughts at a meeting with his psychiatrist, he was prescribed the anti-depressant Zoloft.
The two quickly turned around and ran the other way (it is believed, but not confirmed, that Sanders was heading for the library to help evacuate the students there). The shooters came around the corner and shot at both of them, hitting Dave Sanders in the chest as he reached the South Hallway but missing the student. All the students in the room were evacuated safely; however, Sanders was not evacuated and died at approximately 3:00 p.m. He was the only teacher killed in the ordeal.
The library massacre
Library victim Patrick Ireland being pulled from library windows after the massacre
As the shooting unfolded, Patti Nielson was on the phone with emergency services, recounting her experience, and trying to get students to take cover under desks. According to transcripts, her call was received by the 9-1-1 operator at 11:25:05 a.m.
Before entering, the shooters threw two bombs into the cafeteria from the staircase in the South Hallway, both of which exploded. At 11:29 a.m., Harris and Klebold entered the library where 52 students, 2 teachers, and 2 librarians were hiding.
As he entered, Harris shot at a display case at the opposite end of the administrative counter, injuring student Evan Todd who was hiding under a copier adjacent to the display case.
Klebold shot at him first, hitting him in the head and back, killing him. Noticing police evacuating students, they began to shoot out the windows; police returned fire.
After a few seconds, Klebold turned away from the windows and fired his shotgun at a nearby table, injuring Patrick Ireland, Daniel Steepleton, and Makai Hall. Harris grabbed his shotgun and walked over to the lower row of computer desks, firing his gun underneath the first desk in the row without looking to see who was under it.
He attempted to pull Isaiah out from underneath the table, but was unsuccessful. Klebold also knelt down and opened fire, hitting and killing Matthew Kechter.
He then approached the table and fired again, killing Lauren Townsend.
Meanwhile, Harris went over to another table where two girls were hiding, bent down to look at them, and dismissed them as pathetic. This incident eventually led to the Cassie Bernall controversy, as some believe the eyewitnesses who continue to back the Bernall claim may have wrongfully attributed the Schnurr/Klebold remark to Bernall due to possible similarities in voice and appearance.
Harris moved to another table and shot twice underneath it, injuring both Nicole Nowlen and John Tomlin.
He came around the east side of the counter and Klebold joined him from the west, both converging near where Evan Todd had moved after the copier incident. Klebold slammed a chair down on top of the computer terminal that was on the library counter, directly above the bureau where Patti Nielson hid.
The two walked out of the library at 11:42 a.m., ending the massacre.
Almost immediately, 34 uninjured and 10 injured students evacuated the room through the north door, which led out to the sidewalk adjacent to the west entrance where the rampage had begun.
They locked themselves in and remained there until they were freed at approximately 3:30 p.m.
Suicide of the shooters
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold caught on the high school's security cameras in the cafeteria shortly before committing suicide
After leaving the library, the pair went into the science area and threw a small fire bomb into an empty storage closet. Once inside, they shot at police through the west windows again, without success.
Authorities reported pipe bombs by 1:00 p.m., and two SWAT teams entered the school at 1:09 p.m., moving from classroom to classroom, discovering hidden students and faculty. All students, teachers, and school employees were taken away, questioned, and then offered medical care in small holding areas before being bussed to meet with their family members at Leawood Elementary. Officials found bodies in the library by 3:30 p.m.
By 4:00 p.m.
The estimate was ten over the true count but closer to the total count of wounded students. An official statement was also released stating that there were fifteen confirmed deaths and twenty-seven injuries related to the massacre.
On April 30, high-ranking officials of Jefferson County and the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office met to decide if they should reveal that Michael Guerra, a Sheriff's Office detective, had drafted an affidavit for a search warrant of Harris's residence a year before the shootings, based on his previous investigation of Harris's website and activities.
They decided not to disclose this information at a press conference held on April 30, nor did they mention it in any other way. Harris often created levels for Doom that were widely distributed, and can still be found on the Internet as the Harris levels.
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold hadn't been bullied, they weren't Goths or in the Trenchcoat Mafia, were not loners and video games did not influence their behaviour. This has been questioned, as both Harris and Klebold had a close circle of friends and a wider informal social group.
Bullying
Some commentators charged that school administrators and teachers at Columbine had long condoned a climate of bullying by the so-called jocks or athletes, allowing an atmosphere of outright intimidation and resentment to fester which, they claimed, could have helped trigger the perpetrators' extreme violence. Reportedly, homophobic remarks were directed at the Klebold and Harris. However, later police investigations indicated that Harris and Klebold engaged in bullying instead.
Goth subculture
In the weeks following the shootings, media reports about the two students portrayed them as part of a Goth cult and an increase in suspicions of Goth subculture was manifest after the shootings. Harris and Klebold were thought to be part of an informal school club called the Trenchcoat Mafia.
The active protocol has proved successful at numerous shootings during the past decade.