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It was during this time that the deadly bond between Harris and Klebold truly took shape. Dylan Klebold (left) and Eric Harris. One of his last entries reads: Im stuck in humanity. Harris wore preppy clothes, played soccer well, and developed an interest in computers. Additionally, violent video games and music were blamed for influencing the killers. The truth is, there was a massive amount of psychological turmoil and potential chemical imbalances that when combined with social stagnancy caused them to lash out in ways that no one wanted to imagine. The deadliest school shooting in U.S. history took place on April 16, 2007, when a gunman killed 32 people before killing himself at Virginia Tech, a university in Blacksburg, Virginia. Eric Harris (left) and Dylan Klebold in the school cafeteria during the Columbine shooting on April 20, 1999. Virginia parents, teachers worry about gun violence after school shootings. Demonstrators attend the March for Our Lives rally, March 24, 2018, in Washington, D.C. Two Connecticut State Police officers escort a class of students and two adults out of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., Dec. 14, 2012, after a shooter entered the building and killed 20 children and six adults before taking his own life. Subsequent investigations determined Harris and Klebold chose their victims randomly, and the two teens originally had intended to bomb their school, potentially killing hundreds of people. The tapes of the NRA discussions were recorded secretly by a participant and shared on the condition that the participant's name not be divulged. For slightly under an hour, the pair killed a dozen of their peers, one teacher, and wounded 20 more people. They rush straight to the gunfire. The Chicago Tribune reported that in the videos, Harris and Klebold had their friends pretend to be jocks, and they pretended to be gunmen shooting them. The production included practical effects for gunshot wounds. . The problem was that his father picked up the phone, and Harris had to claim it was a wrong number. By spring 1998, they were already planning Judgement Day or NBK, shorthand for the film Natural Born Killers. March 6, 1999. Eric Harris, as photographed for the Columbine High School yearbook. Thomas said Tuesday that the sheriff has not told him of any witness statements from students who named a third gunman. Go home.. One girl was shot in the chest nine times. Fifteen-year-old Columbine freshman Laura Farber was in the cafeteria when a janitor yelled for everyone to get under the tables. Stone did say he expects that fingerprint analyses of bullets and bomb materials will show that Harris and Klebold had help in planning the shootings. I agree," says Makris. Jefferson County Sheriffs Department via Getty ImagesFrom left, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold examine a sawed-off shotgun at a makeshift shooting range. Thirty-seven percent last less than 5 minutes. Often, Harris cruelty was unfocused and not tied to any particular slight. Klebold allegedly shouted Were going to kill every one of you, and the Columbine shooters began shooting at people indiscriminately and tossing pipe bombs around without any notion of who exactly would be killed. Well, you're true. DeAngelis herded them into a gym storage area. Three of these shootings -- Sandy Hook, Parkland and Virginia Tech -- were deadlier than Columbine. But in other cases, states will loosen laws after mass shootings to make it easier to buy guns and get permits. DeAngelis, who spent 18 years as principal, retired in 2014 -- after he felt he had done his duty to heal the community. When Bernall allegedly said, Yes, she was shot to death. His family then moved to Colorado once he became a teenager. U.S. schools have undergone many other security and preparation upgrades these last two decades, and in the wake of Columbine, local police started storing school blueprints to help map out response plans. Forty-eight minutes ticked by at Columbine before SWAT entered the building, DeAngelis said, as the officers first had to get their gear at their precincts -- leaving DeAngelis and the police at the scene feeling helpless. Circa 1998. Seemingly deeply repentant, he maintained straight-As and never missed a counseling session. Columbine shooter Eric Harris practices shooting a weapon at a makeshift shooting range. At approximately 11:19 a.m., Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, dressed in trench coats, began shooting fellow students outside Columbine High School, located in a suburb south of Denver. The motives for Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold to carry out the Columbine High School massacre had nothing to do with bullying or revenge and the real truth is even more disturbing. It initially was reported that one student, Cassie Bernall, was asked by one of the gunmen if she believed in God. Within an hour, 18-year-old Harris and his 17-year-old partner Dylan Klebold a fellow Columbine High School student and Browns friend since first grade were dead. On the website, Harris AOL profile where he wrote under the name Reb for Rebel, sometimes RebDoomer, he detailed his nocturnal exploits with VoDka (Klebolds screen name), describing various acts of vandalism including building pipe bombs and his desire to kill people namely, Brooks Brown. Apparently, Klebold got cold feet when the cafeteria did not explode. Had the presiding judge seen the Browns report, or if the resultant search warrant had been executed, Harris would have been rejected and jailed for the van theft and the police would have found his growing pipe bomb arsenal. Some victims and families of people killed or injured filed suit against the school and the police; most of these suits were later dismissed in court. America endured school shootings before Columbine, but never "one quite like that one," said ABC News contributor and former FBI agent Brad Garrett. DeAngelis tried to get back inside the school, but officers said he couldn't -- they had to secure the perimeter and wait for SWAT. It was the most anxious hour of my life, she said. Stone's remarks about a possible third attacker marked the latest turn in a case that has seen authorities appear at odds with each other over developments in the investigation. What changed between August 10, 1998 his last suicide threat and the attack on April 20, 1999, is unknown. Farber is now a filmmaker and released a documentary this month in which she followed several of her fellow survivors as they returned to the Columbine room where they were when gunfire erupted. Harris secured advances for them both to purchase last-minute supplies. "Don't anybody kid yourself about this great macho thing of going down there and showing our chest and showing how damn tough we are. Though Harris temperament and behavior were seemingly as normal as anyone elses at his age, he did appear to have trouble finding his place in Littleton. In early 1998, Harris stopped posting online and began keeping a notebook he titled The Book of God, mostly dedicated to his homicidal fantasies and nihilistic philosophy. Klebold had actually been keeping his own diary, Existences: A Virtual Book, since the previous spring. Eric Harris in a scene from the Columbine shooters, the biggest mass shooting in U.S. history left Las Vegas in terror, Harris had moved around fairly often as a child, considered gifted as early as grammar school, the Trenchcoat Mafia and other Columbine myths. On April 20th 1999, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold shot and killed 13 people and then turned the guns on themselves. "I remember distinctly shots being fired, glass breaking behind me. Gunfire. He is intelligent enough to achieve lofty goals as long as he stays on task and remains motivated.. They learned about it in the newspaper. "It really felt like we were going to go to school the next day," and she figured she needed to do her homework, Farber recalled. Jefferson County Sheriffs Office/Getty ImagesThe west entryway to Columbine High School, with flags marking points where bullet casings were found. And it was all thanks to two troubled teens: Columbine shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. Omissions? Police respond to a shooting that injured teacher Abigail Zwerner at Richneck Elementary in Newport News in January. "We have meeting insurance," LaPierre replies. Writing since 2004, his articles on Spiritualism, grave robbery, document relics, and other topics have appeared in Mental Floss, Atlas Obscura, Fine Books, and Collections Magazine. Because of her "troubling" comments and actions -- including buying three one . Brown joined the theater department and Klebold followed, working backstage as a soundboard operator. A caller told 911 operators she saw a Black man get out of a vehicle, run toward a store entrance, then return to the car to retrieve a gun before running back to the store, according to . No Easy Answers: The Full Story Of The Columbine High School Shooting. Eric Harris was born on April 9, 1981, in Wichita, Kansas, which is where he spent his early childhood. It also was speculated that Harris and Klebold had carried out the shootings as retaliation for being bullied. Columbine High School massacre Tools On April 20, 1999, a school shooting and attempted bombing occurred at Columbine High School in Columbine, Colorado, United States. The NRA's public relations gurus weren't just worried about the propriety of the gun show, either. "Even on the first day, a lot of students said that. Charlton Heston (left), then president of the NRA, meets with fellow leaders Wayne LaPierre (far right) and Jim Baker (center) on April 30, 1999, ahead of the NRA's annual meeting in Denver. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. reaching back to the Columbine High School massacre in 1999. . "One of the big issues in Columbine was law enforcement wasn't trained to go after the shooter," said Garrett, the former FBI agent. Kevin Moloney/Getty Images About 100 yards away was a gunman coming toward him. It was only once Eric Harris And Dylan Klebold joined forces that their shared dissatisfaction began to morph into something more tangible. Klebold and Harris were no longer mere fans of violent video games like Doom but had obtained three weapons that would later be used in the shooting from a female friend who was old enough to purchase guns in the state of Colorado. In the window of one classroom, a student put up a piece of paper that read, Help me, Im bleeding. Others tried to get out through heating vents or used anything at their disposal desks and chairs to barricade themselves. Craig F. Walker/The Denver Post via Getty ImagesEvidence, including the propane bombs, presented to the public five years after the Columbine shooting. In the aftermath of the shootings, many schools across America enacted zero-tolerance rules regarding disruptive behavior and threats of violence from students. On TV, the sheriff labeled Brooks Brown an accomplice to silence him. In 1998, junior Brooks Brown discovered his name on that very website and that Harris had threatened to murder him. In the wake of the 2002 Columbine school massacre, for example, victims sued video-game makers and movie producers and distributors, . Does that look bad, or does it look uh MAKRIS: Well, I mean, that can be twisted too. Get out of here. But then, the sounds became faster. Though they were merely placed into a diversion program consisting of community service and counseling, the two were released a month early. A school bus in 1999 passes a billboard advertising the NRA's annual meeting in Denver, previously scheduled to take place just 10 days after the shooting at Columbine High School. His depression and rage simmered and showed themselves in his work, once even causing him to hand in an essay so gruesome his teacher later remarked that it was the most vicious story shed ever read.. Kevin Moloney/Getty Images From the Denver Post photo archive. While Brown distracted her, Harris covered himself and a nearby rock with fake blood, letting out a scream before playing dead. to release the bodycam videos and has shared little about a third-party probe of its police force. LaPierre claims that Senate Majority Whip Don Nickles, R-Okla., had secretly asked him for talking points to use after the shooting. April 20, 1999. He can be heard on the recordings obtained by NPR calling some NRA supporters "nuts." When emergency services arrived, the pair planned, they would detonate bombs attached to Klebolds car and demolish any rescue efforts. ", Farber wanted life to go on "as normal as possible," but "there's just always this underlying feeling of guilt," she said. Harris journal is more single-minded. An NRA spokesperson called the story a "hit piece" and complained that the NRA was denied the tape. . hide caption. One thing that hasn't changed is that school shootings are still happening, with one after another unfolding in the 20 years since Columbine. In this week's StoryCorps, we hear about a student who endured the 1999 shooting at Columbine High School in Colorado, and later returned to the school as a teacher. Mark Leffingwell/Getty ImagesA pump-action shotgun and assault rifle used in the Columbine High School shooting. Originally planned for April 19 the anniversary of the Waco Siege and the Oklahoma City Bombing the attack, Harris hoped, would beat Timothys McVeighs body count in Oklahoma. A week before that bombing, the NRA put out a fundraising letter calling the ATF "jackbooted government thugs," and after the bombing, LaPierre had defended this rhetoric. But if the officer had followed them inside, "there's a good chance" the gunmen wouldn't have reached the library, where so many classmates were targeted, DeAngelis said. Ultimately the desire is to regain control. Indeed, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold fostered an unhealthy interest in Hitler, Nazi iconography, and the violence of the Third Reich. Hes not saying that hes gonna beat me up, hes saying he wants to blow me up and hes talking about how hes making the pipe bombs to do it with.. "You're so immature and innocent. Its a perception that directly inspired the modern anti-bullying movement and spawned a recurring media trope appearing in films and television series like 13 Reasons Why, Degrassi, Law & Order, and others. Littleton residents gather at the Clemment Park memorial on Apr. The shooting happened more than a year ago, on April 25, after police responded to a report of a man with a gun at the Meijer store on Lake Lansing Road. "The dirty secret of this day and age is that political gain and media ratings all too often bloom on fresh graves. From this, it can be inferred that Harris had to convince Klebold to go through with the attack at the last minute. Thirteen people lay dead at a high school in Colorado. The man unloaded one of the pistols across the fronts of four innocents. From a few jumbled pieces, the flawed popular image began to form: Klebold was in the theater department, so he was gay and mocked for it. "When we lost control of a situation and the result was a half a million members, the president of the United States bailing out on us and a firestorm of negative media that if you went back and looked at, it was probably in the hundreds of millions of dollars in opposition to us and our point of view.". In order to crack the surface of why the Columbine shooters went to slaughter that day in April, we have to take a close and objective look at Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold beneath the headlines and beyond the mythologized facade. Klebold, a Colorado native, was noted for his shyness and intellect. "Everything seemed to slow down," he recalled. "There was quite possibly one other person shooting," Stone said. There was a girl crouched beneath a desk in the library, and the guy came over and said, Peek a boo, and shot her in the neck, said Kirkland, recalling Klebolds vicious killing of Cassie Bernall. The two teens bonded over their shared dissatisfaction with school but varied significantly in their personality traits and dispositions. . Mass shootings are. Brown was confused, but that was nothing new in his relationship with Harris. One night, Brown recalled, he and another friend were up at 3 a.m. playing video games at his house. One student saw either Harris or Klebold (the account remains unclear) shoot a kid at point-blank range, in the back of the head. They want us to play the heavy in their drama of packaged grief." Several other journal entries are signed Goodbye as if he expected them to be his last ones. Meanwhile, just as a new school shooting reignites the gun control debate, it also introduces a new, shocked community to Columbine's unfortunate club, and as the leaders of the pack, Columbine survivors feel a duty to pay it forward. Farber hopes the film will reach trauma survivors beyond Columbine and help them move past their own experiences. 840 Columbine High School Massacre Photos and Premium High Res Pictures - Getty Images CREATIVE EDITORIAL VIDEO All Sports Entertainment News Archival Browse 840 columbine high school massacre photos and images available, or start a new search to explore more photos and images. News of the Columbine tragedy stunned the country. CNN . Wikimedia CommonsColumbine shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold in the school cafeteria during the massacre. Feb. 26, 2004. Jefferson County Sheriffs Department via Getty ImagesFrom left, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold examine a sawed-off shotgun at a makeshift firing range not long before the Columbine shooting. "I'd say to teachers or kids, 'I don't know about you, but gosh, I'm having a hard time sleeping, I have no appetite, and I'm having these bad dreams.'". Then, read about Brenda Ann Spencer, the woman who shot up a school because she didnt like Mondays. Wayne LaPierre, the executive vice president of the NRA, is seen here in a photo taken just weeks after the 1999 Columbine shooting. While Eric Harris was an unpredictable ball of volatile energy, Dylan Klebold appeared more introverted, vulnerable, and quietly disillusioned. At some point, Klebold committed to the NBK plan, although perhaps he only thought about it as an elaborately theatrical suicide. Victims families fought and failed in Colorado courts to get documents released. On April 20, 1999, they entered Columbine High School in Jefferson county with semiautomatic rifles, pistols, and several explosives. NPR reached out to the NRA and provided it with transcripts of the audio we used in this story. As Brown began to confront him, Harris interrupted him: It doesnt matter anymore. The shootings were carried out by Eric Harris, age 18, and Dylan Klebold, age 17. especially life. Then, learn about Brenda Ann Spencer, who shot up a school because she didnt like Mondays. When that victim replied, Yes, the shooter walked away. Baker can also be heard telling others not to worry about the stance of the firearms industry. Through journals left behind by Harris and Klebold, investigators eventually discovered the teens had been planning for a year to bomb the school in an attack similar to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. May 1999. On the morning of Tuesday, April 20, 1999, Columbine High School senior Brooks Brown noted something strange. As his fathers career pulled him out of schools and away from friends leaving Plattsburgh, New York in 1993 for Colorado Harris increasingly retreated into the computer and the internet. "I think the evidence will show there were more than two people involved in this," the sheriff said. The NRA considered other options as well, as illustrated by this exchange: NRA OFFICIAL KAYNE ROBINSON: Is there something concrete that we can offer? "And that was so important.". It was like they were having the time of their life.. Columbine High School and other Denver area schools closed while police searched for an armed woman 'infatuated' with Columbine, days ahead of the 20th anniversary of the school shooting. Brown, an admitted slacker, was routinely late, which drove Harris crazy. "Made that point earlier. Eric Harris, born in Wichita, Kansas, was the son of an Air Force pilot and spent much of his childhood moving from place to place. In the ensuing firestorm, former Republican President George H.W. A few days later, Harris and Klebold missed school. "I got to tell you, we got to think this thing through, because if we tuck tail and run, we're going to be accepting responsibility for what happened out there," says NRA official Jim Land. Just after the deadly shooting at Columbine High School in 1999, gun control advocates rallied at the Colorado State Capitol to protest the NRA's annual meeting that year in Denver. That connection earned Harris some more popularity and he even managed to find a date for freshman homecoming. The shooting took place almost exactly eight years after the Columbine shooting, when a 23-year-old student opened fire at two locations on campus - first in a dorm room and then in an academic building across campus. Harris father Wayne managed to get both boys into a Juvenile Diversion program. Harris and Klebold met in middle school but didnt become inseparable until midway through high school. Mario Tama/AFP via Getty Images Public DomainSketches and notes taken from Eric Harris journal. Kevin Moloney/Getty Images By then, the popular beliefs about what had happened on April 20, 1999 were seared into the collective consciousness. That was in February 1999. "Many of the kids at Columbine said, 'I'm fine, I'm fine, I don't need to talk to anyone,'" DeAngelis said. At approximately 11:19 a.m., Dylan Klebold, 17, and Eric . Survivors and police expressed confusion about why the shooting abruptly stopped. From left, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold examine a sawed-off shotgun at a makeshift shooting range. So it's a double-edged sword.". Drawings from the journal of Eric Harris. Unfortunately, none of this was discovered or taken seriously before it was too late for the Columbine shooters. Two months later, the massacre took place. "Then you add the social media aspect -- making sure that we see what is going on with the kids' social media.". Brooks, I like you now. Police began to doubt there was a third gunman when they found suspects Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, dead of apparent suicides -- one of them in a black trenchcoat, and the other having removed his black trenchcoat, and wearing a white shirt, Davis said. "For NRA to scrap this and the amount of money that we have spent ". There was blood everywhere and sprinkler systems set off by the pipe bombs only added to the chaos. And in those private moments, the NRA considered a strikingly more sympathetic posture toward mass shootings than the uncompromising stance it has taken publicly in the decades since, even considering a $1 million fund to care for the victims. Furious, Brown told his and Harris parents about the latters mischief, drinking, and other bad behavior. States have had the most control over gun laws, Garrett said, with very little movement at the federal level. A 16-year-old girl -- the gunman's target -- was killed. Columbine shooting. Finally, after one argument that winter, Brown told Harris he would never give him a ride again. The boys and their coworkers would routinely goof around during slow hours, drinking beer and shooting bottle rockets off the roof. Their efforts originally, with bombs, were supposed to kill 300+ people so that they would forever be the "high score". They slowly drifted to the peripheries of their community, actively giving each other a Hitler salute as a greeting or while bowling together. Prior to Columbine, nobody understood what the term 'active shooter' meant Nowadays, we go to the sound of . Colorado's governor has signed four gun control bills five months after a mass shooting at an LGBTQ nightclub. Because their story needs a villain. Harris and Klebold werent just playing video games like Doom in their spare time, but also used the Internets DIY resources, including The Anarchist Cookbook, The Guardian reported, to learn about sophisticated bomb making. For a year before the Columbine shooting, Harris dedicated himself to building dozens of explosives: pipe bombs and crickets made from CO2 canisters. Eric Harris, as photographed for the Columbine yearbook. At least 143 people have been killed in school shootings since Columbine, according to The Washington Post (school shootings are not tallied by the federal government, The Post notes). In the larger view, the Columbine massacre set off a national debate on how to end gun violence in schools, and a growing number of schools throughout the country invested in private security forces and metal detectors. In the days immediately following the shootings, it was speculated that Harris and Klebold purposely chose athletes, minorities and Christians as their victims. "Screw the insurance," says Hammer. The journals of both Harris and Klebold provide insight into both their planning of Judgement Day and their psychological makeup at that time. April 20, 1999. Parents wait for news after reports of a shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., on Feb. 14, 2018. All articles are regularly reviewed and updated by the HISTORY.com team. Investigators are looking for additional evidence to substantiate the witness' claims, he added. "As we got back into the groove of school, I repeatedly emphasized the need to be open to getting help," DeAngelis wrote in his book. Dylan Klebold (left) and Brooks Brown in elementary school. Strangle them, squish their head, rip off their jaw, break their arms in half, show them who is God.. The boys had actually intended to bomb the school the day before, which was the anniversary of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. Columbine shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold in the school cafeteria during the massacre. Some captured the nation's attention: the horror of the mass murder of 20 young children and six educators in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut; the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where 17 were gunned down, allegedly by a former classmate, sparking a student-led revolt for gun reform across the country. At that time, Thomas said it was unlikely that anyone else would be charged with playing a role in the attack itself. Then, they left, allowing the majority to escape. Behind that faade, though, the embarrassment of being caught ignited a spark inside both Harris and Klebold. "The message that it will send is that even the NRA was brought to its knees, and the media will have a field day with it.". The tapes also show that the NRA was shaken by the negative press following the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, which targeted the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms and other federal agencies. On the contrary, Klebolds parents even combined their efforts by forming their own real estate company substantially increasing the familys income and providing a comfortable home environment for Klebold. May 5, 1999 Web posted at: 8:41 a.m. EDT (1241 GMT). "I'd be willing to bet that these Parkland kids will be doing the same thing if these tragedies happen down the road. Thankfully, not one of these bombs went off. LITTLETON, Colorado (CNN) -- Investigators are looking into witness reports of a third gunman involved in the shootings at Columbine High School and also expect to make "one or more" arrests of people involved in planning the attack, according to reports published Wednesday. The footage is a part of a series the pair recorded called Hitmen for Hire. This required more than mere firepower and so Harris and Klebold built pipe bombs over the course of several months before the attack. Almost 19 years after the notorious Columbine High School shooting in the US, survivors reflect on the lessons learned while being divided on gun control and student activism in the wake of recent . When one athlete commented that the group looked like a trench coat mafia, the friends turned it into a badge of pride and the name stuck. Through Klebolds personal writings discovered after the shooting, it became clear that he had been suicidal for a while. Ultimately, the family put down roots in Littleton, Colorado when Harris father retired in 1993. i hate this. The penultimate formal page in Klebolds journal, written five days before the attack, ends with: Time to die, time to be free, time to love. Nearly all the remaining pages are filled with drawings of his intended outfit and weapons. It was a slow, steady relationship that seemed largely based around a mutual hatred and disgust for their surroundings. 24, 1999 to pays respects to 12 students and one teacher who died at Columbine High School following a shooting by two students. "There's that instant credibility, which I think really helps," DeAngelis said. I have something only me and V [Klebold] have, SELF AWARENESS, he wrote a year before the attack. Jefferson County Sheriffs Department via Getty Images. Maybe Harris was pulling a senior prank. By the time law enforcement decided to storm the building, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebolds rampage was long over.