Even though it’s Easter, it’s also a grim day for the people of Littleton, Colo. where the Columbine High School Massacre happened on this day, April 20, 1999.
For a time, it was the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history. And despite the massacre, very little was done correctly. Charlton Heston was the president of the National Rifle Association at the time and he proudly proclaimed everyone’s right to own a firearm in the weeks afterwards. School did everything wrong by making students buy clear or mesh backpacks so they couldn’t conceal anything. They also were forced to tuck their shirts in their waste bands and prevented from where clothes that could be considered “baggy.”
The sad fact was everyone had gotten it wrong about Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the killers. They weren’t bullied. They weren’t part of the “Trenchcoat Mafia,” a group of students who wore trenchcoats. They weren’t fans of Marilyn Manson or Eminem.
The FBI later concluded that Harris had exhibited symptoms of a psychopath with his narcissistic behavior. He and Klebold actually had stolen items from a van during the winter of 1998, gotten caught and convicted. It’s believed the April 20 date was because it was the day of their sentencing. Even though people believed it had to do with Adolf Hitler, who was born on April 20, 1899, that wasn’t the case. It was retaliation against the court system.
It is believed that Harris and Klebold were racists. One of their victims, Isaiah Shoels, 16, was black and Klebold had reportedly called him the N-word before Shoels was killed.
Columbine changed America. It’s crazy it was four years and one day from the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City. Oddly, Klebold was born on Sept. 11, 1981.
While I don’t doubt Harris and Klebold were victims of bullying and taunts, they weren’t exactly as treated as bad as some people believed. You’re going to have people who are snobbish no matter the school environment. Klebold had even gone to the prom weeks prior. Even some of the “more popular” kids didn’t go to the prom when I was in school. But rather than examine how they used straw purchases to buy their firearms, Americans seemed to push for more lenient gun laws. Harris who turned 18 on April 9 could’ve purchased rifles and shotguns in many states even though Colorado still has the age at 21.
Sadly, many years later, the massacre claimed another victim. On Feb. 16, Anne Marie Hochhalter, 43, had died from sepsis that was believed to have been from the two gunshot wounds in the chest and back that made her paralyzed from the waist down for the rest of her life.
After she recovered as much as she could in the 2000s, she became a strong advocate of gun regulations and Social Security benefits for people with disabilities. Rest in peace, Ms. Hochhalter. Peace and love be with you.
And peace and love be with the family and friends of:
- Rachel Scott, 18
- Daniel Rohrbrough, 15
- William David Sanders, 47
- Kyle Velasquez, 16
- Steven Curnow, 14
- Cassie Bernall, 17
- Isaiah Shoels, 18
- Matthew Kechter, 16
- Lauren Townsend, 18
- Kelly Fleming, 16
- Daniel Mauser, 15
- Corey DePooter, 17
Zane Says 