Columbine

by Jeff Kass

  For one class, Eric’s assignment was to reflect upon a variety of newspaper articles. He commented on an editorial about death: “With medical technology and thousands of safety procedures in today’s society, I believe the majority of people think, ‘oh, I’ll talk about death some other time, it’s not like I’ll be dying soon.’ It may be a hard topic, but oh well, it definitely needs to be discussed in case of the terrible event that a loved one slips into a coma or something of that nature.”

  Eric discussed a story about people who didn’t move out of the way of emergency vehicles such as ambulances—something hard to read without recalling the ambulances staged outside Columbine after the shootings. “Completely ridiculous that motorists risk the lives of others that are in desperate need of medical attention because of their arrogance,” Eric wrote.

  One classroom piece was certainly among the dearest to his heart: The Brady Bill requiring licensed gun dealers to perform background checks on customers and the use of an FBI database. “The FBI just shot themselves in the foot,” Eric opined, with a bit of humor, even though the FBI was not responsible for passing the law. “There are a few loopholes in the new Brady bill. The biggest gaping hole is that the background checks are only required for licensed dealers . . . not private dealers.”

  It was a loophole Eric and Dylan would soon exploit, and another idea Eric translated to his diary:

  Fuck you Brady! all I want is a couple of guns, and thanks to your fucking bill I will probably not get any! come on, I’ll have a clean record and I only want for personal protection. Its not like I’m some psycho who would go on a shooting spree . . . fuckers.

  In the same entry, Eric switched from aggression to melancholy, and back to aggression.

  Everyone is always making fun of me because of how I look, how fucking weak I am and shit, well I will get you all back: ultimate fucking revenge here. you people could have shown more respect, treated me better, asked for knowledge or guidence more, treated me more like a senior and maybe I wouldn’t have been so ready to tear your fucking heads off. Then again, I have always hated how I looked, I make fun of people who look like me, sometimes without even thinking sometimes just because I want to rip on myself. Thats where a lot of my hate grows from. The fact that I have practically no selfesteem, especially concerning girls and looks and such. therefore people make fun of me . . . constantly . . . therefore I get no respect and therefore I get fucking PISSED. as of this date I have enough explosives to kill about 100 people, and then if I get a couple of bayonets, swords, axes, whatever I’ll be able to kill at least 10 more and that just isnt enough! GUNS! I need guns! Give me some fucking firearms!

  ∞

  Robyn Anderson would ask Dylan to the senior prom. But first, he asked her to the Tanner Gun Show.

  Robyn was slightly chubby with a round face and short, blonde hair. Her looks were average. She was a churchgoer and straight-A student who, on a Sunday, bought three of the four guns used at Columbine. She was never prosecuted for a crime, but after the shootings, did not attend high school graduation.

  Robyn thought Dylan was smart but didn’t always exert himself. He was quiet and got along well with others—at least he tended to do what the group wanted—but he was also content to be alone and play computer games. Robyn knew Eric and Dylan didn’t mesh with the jocks, but they never talked about Hitler or killing, and never wore swastikas. Robyn did not talk politics with them, and if she had to label them with any religious belief, it was atheism. Robyn says she never knew about Dylan’s infatuation with bombs and even after Columbine maintained, “He really wasn’t like the person that committed this crime.”

  When Robyn first met Dylan in 1995, she thought he was a “rough guy,” but came to call him one of the sweetest people she knew, and friends say she was infatuated with him. He didn’t return the spark and they never dated, but she called him about three times a week and they usually went midnight bowling on Fridays. Others would join them, including Eric, but Robyn never said much to him.

  Robyn had visited the Klebold home and spoken with Dylan’s parents maybe three times. “They were caring parents, from what I could tell,” she said. “He—his mom would call him Dyl, you know. ‘We’re just going to a movie, Dyl, we’ll be back.’ They would—you know, they wanted to know where he was going to be and who he was with, and basic parenting rules.” The Klebolds, for their part, knew Robyn as someone who studied calculus with Dylan. They called her “very sweet.”

  Eric and Dylan called her the ticket to the gun show. They were one year under eighteen and could not purchase guns themselves. But Robyn could. Eighteen days earlier, she had turned eighteen.

  On November 22, 1998 Eric and Dylan picked up Robyn at about 10:00 a.m. and talked about wanting a shotgun. Robyn did not want to submit to a background check, but Eric and Dylan had already scouted the gun show for “private dealers,” so Robyn did not have to complete any paperwork.

  At the show, the trio walked over to the man Eric and Dylan had spoken with the day before, Ronald Frank Hartmann, fifty-nine. He had served twenty years in the U.S. Armed Forces and after that worked as a civilian government employee. He had a Stevens double-barrel shotgun for sale that was manufactured around 1969. The gun was almost as old as Eric and Dylan combined, but they would launch it into history.

  Eric and Dylan asked Hartmann if he had anything shorter than the double barrel and he brought out a tape measure to show them how far down they could legally cut the barrel. Hartmann asked Eric and Dylan if they had “brought someone eighteen years old this time.” They said they had.

  Hartmann asked Anderson her age. She said she was eighteen but looked young, so Hartmann asked for ID. She produced her driver’s license.

  Hartmann told her the shotgun was $245, about the same price they would pay for every gun they bought that day. Robyn pulled a wallet out of her bag, brimming with Dylan’s money, and counted out the cash. She paid mostly in twenties and no receipt was given. Hartmann went to hand the shotgun to Robyn but Dylan took it.

  “Are you going to be a gentleman and carry it for her?” Hartmann asked.

  “Yes,” Dylan replied.

  Anderson seemed timid and nervous, but Hartmann figured it was her first gun purchase. She and Dylan both seemed clean cut. Nothing to worry about.

  Hartmann then turned to his friend and fellow gun vendor James Washington, a fifty-year-old Colorado Springs resident working as a senior investigative and security specialist with the Defense Security Service. (One of the agency’s jobs is performing background checks for government agencies.)

  “That girl just turned eighteen,” Hartmann said.

  Robyn, Eric and Dylan then searched for another private dealer. Now it was Eric’s turn and he negotiated for another shotgun. A large binder clip in Robyn’s purse held Eric’s money and Robyn can’t recall if she paid for the gun or if Eric handed over the money. The dealer did not ask for any ID. Again, there was no receipt, and again, the gun was about thirty years old.

  One more gun to go. One more private dealer. This time, it was a black 9mm carbine rifle in a box with two magazine clips. Robyn was asked for her ID, and the seller double-checked with someone at another table. Again, the money held together with a binder clip was produced. Again, Robyn couldn’t remember if she or Eric actually handed the money over. Again, there was no receipt.

  Eric and Dylan also purchased bullets, and Eric bought a folding knife. (Robyn said she played no part in those transactions.) All told, it took about an hour.

  Robyn told police Eric and Dylan buying guns did not surprise her because they had jobs and didn’t spend money on anything else like dating. She thought the guns might be for hunting or a gun collection.

  But Eric and Dylan never talked about hunting, and when Dylan tried to shoot a deer in his backyard with a BB gun his mom wouldn’t let him. The boys also asked Robyn not to say anything a
bout the guns. They, in turn, promised not to mention her.

  So as they were leaving the gun show, a thought crossed Robyn’s mind. Maybe they would shoot someone.

  “You guys aren’t going to do anything stupid, are you?” she asked.

  “No,” they said.

  Robyn says that if she had known about plans for Columbine, she would have told police.

  ∞

  After the gun show, they dropped off Eric at his house. Eric put his two guns and other merchandise in the trunk of his car.

  “Well folks, today was a very important day,” he wrote in his diary.

  “We have GUNS! We fucking got em you sons of bitches! HA!! HA HA HA! Neener! Booga Booga. heh it’s all over now.”

  Eric inserted a small drawing of a man sticking out his tongue, putting his thumbs in his ears, and waving his fingers to tease.

  “This capped it off, the point of no return.”

  Despite his joy, Eric still had an empty heart. “It’s really a shame,” he wrote. “I had a lot of fun at that gun show, I would have loved it if you were there dad. we would have done some major bonding. would have been great.”

  But he quickly snapped: “If [I] have to cheat and lie to everyone then that’s fine. THIS is what I am motivated for. THIS is my goal, THIS is what I want ‘to do with my life.’”

  Dylan went with Robyn to her house. She got in her car and followed Dylan to his house. They were going to study calculus. Dylan drove his car into the garage, put the shotgun under his jacket, and with his other purchases in a bag, went up to his room.

  ∞

  As they were purchasing the guns, Eric was finalizing a proposed business project for government and economics class: “Hit-Men For Hire.” Eric’s two-paragraph product overview was, “In this city, protection is needed. Day by day people grow more and more agitated with one another and become less understanding and forgiving. Even though programs made by anti-hate groups and police try to keep people from being prejudiced and having stereotypes, most people are still the same.

  “The so-called ‘Trench Coat Mafia’ is a small group of friends who generally wear dark clothes, military fatigues, and long black dusters. Most people usually just stare and whisper when they see us. We don’t mind because we generally don’t like people anyway. Now they have reasons to stay clear of us.”

  In the “map” section Eric wrote, “The locations in the Columbine area are strategically positioned so we can launch attacks in almost any neighborhood with a few minutes notice. We also have caches of weaponry and explosives located around the CHS area and in certain fields, all to serve you, the customer.”

  In the paper, Eric leveled with the teacher: “The business is basically to kill people who anger our clients.” He added, “Several weapons, such as a sawed-off pump-action riot gun, an AB-10 machine pistol, home made rocket launchers, swords and daggers were gathered to help our business.”

  Eric discussed the money aspect of the business and noted, “Political contributions are the main expense.”

  Some five years after Columbine, police released the video for the assignment. Eric Veik, a friend of Eric and Dylan, stars as the dork. Wearing a tie and windbreaker, he tells the camera in a whiny voice: “People are always making fun of me. I don’t like it. I really don’t, it makes me mad.”

  Then Eric and Dylan, wearing sunglasses, confidently stride down an alley.

  “Oooh,” Veik says in awe.

  “We’re here to protect you, for a cost,” Eric says.

  “I’ll pay anything,” Veik replies.

  Eric quotes him $20 a day but adds, “You know, we can’t have weapons on school grounds.”

  That’s OK with Veik.

  “We’ll protect you [at] school, then take away any bullies that are picking on you, whatever,” Eric says. “Off school grounds, we can relocate this person. That would be $1,000.”

  “Thank you so much,” Veik says.

  Then a “jock,” walks down the alley. Eric and Dylan surprise him, draw their guns, and shoot.

  In what appear to be outtakes, or what Veik calls “intimidation scenes,” Eric and Dylan yell at the supposed bully.

  “No you goddamn piece of punk ass shit,” screams Dylan, dressed in a trench coat and backwards baseball cap. “Do not mess with that friggin kid. If you do, I’ll rip off your god damn head and shove it so far up your friggin ass, you’ll be coughing up dandruff for four friggin months.”

  Eric, dressed in jeans, a black blazer, and backwards baseball cap, also does a mock dress-down of the imaginary bully. He talks like a drill sergeant with a commanding lilt. His eyes bulge out, and he stares into the camera. “Look, I don’t care what you say,” Eric threatens. “If you ever touch him again, I will frickin kill you. I’m going to pull out a goddamn shotgun and blow your damn head off. Do you understand? You little worthless piece of crap.”

  ∞

  On or around December 18, almost a month after the gun show, Ronald Martin received a call at his Lakewood store, Green Mountain Guns. The caller asked about magazines for the Hi-Point rifle. Martin said he could order them, but they would have to be pre-paid. On December 18, Eric Harris walked in. Martin took the order, which he thought was unusual because of the large number of magazines—nine—and because the Hi-Point was not considered a good gun. Eric paid $143.51 in cash. Someone from Green Mountain later called Eric’s house to let him know the order had arrived. Wayne Harris took the call but said he hadn’t ordered anything.

  “Yes, they did have the right number,” Eric would later say. He picked up the order on December 29. It was almost Happy New Year—Eric and Dylan’s last.

  Eric and Dylan unsuccessfully lobbied another Columbine student and various Blackjack co-workers to buy the fourth gun. One co-worker was Philip Duran, twenty-two at the time of Columbine. He didn’t want his name on any paperwork but put them in touch with Mark Manes. Manes, twenty-one, was fascinated with guns although his mother Diann was a member of Handgun Control, the group chaired by the wife of James Brady, namesake of the Brady bill.

  On January 23, 1999, Eric and Dylan were about to graduate the diversion program with flying colors. They also hit familiar ground and met Manes and Duran at the Tanner Gun Show. They looked at TEC-9s before Manes agreed to sell them one he already owned for $500.

  That night, Dylan went to Manes’ house and gave him $300. Two weeks later Manes, Duran, Eric, and Dylan went to an informal shooting range in a forested area about an hour south of Denver known as Rampart Range. Manes forgot to ask Dylan for the other $200 he was owed, so he had Duran be the intermediary.

  A week after the first shooting practice, Manes went to the shooting range a second time with Eric and a couple other people, but Dylan had to work. A third time Eric and Dylan were again together with Duran, Manes, and Manes’ girlfriend, Jessica Miklich. It is March 6, just over a month before Columbine, and Eric and Dylan have surprises: A video camera and two sawed-off shotguns. The camera is from Columbine High, but they will not say where they got the guns. Duran will film the outing.

  Eric is dressed in a Denver Broncos sweatshirt while both he and Dylan wear backwards baseball caps and black trench coats. Their video has no plot, only a fifteen-minute stream of consciousness shooting gallery as Eric, Dylan, and the others blast nearly two hundred rounds at whatever is around them.

  “Look at the top of the thing,” Dylan says of a pockmarked bowling pin.

  “Lead pellets all around,” someone else says.

  There is laughter. Dylan fires the double-barrel shotgun into a pine tree, leaving a hole. “That’s a fucking slug,” he says.

  The next line about a shotgun slug is the most chilling, although it is unclear who speaks it: “Imagine that in someone’s fucking brain.”

  “It hurt my wrist like a son of a bitch,” Dylan chimes in.

 
“You’ve got an entry and exit wound there,” Eric says of the bowling pin. At one point, he blows on the tip of the shotgun barrel as if to clear any smoke.

  Their hands are bleeding from the heavy recoil of the shotguns. “Guns are bad when you saw them off and make them illegal,” someone says. “Bad things happen to you. Just say no to sawed-offs.”

  “Bad,” says Eric, who spanks his shotgun.

  “No, no, no,” Klebold says to his shotgun.

  The Basement Tapes

  Eric and Dylan hoped a big-time director would make a movie about them. Maybe Spielberg, maybe Tarantino. Their own home movies were dumb, funny, and violent. Their video Bible was the so-called “basement tapes.” Ghoulish, insightful, and all over the map. The basement tapes were not for class, but for the whole world to see.

  Eric explains that he wants to kill “niggers, spics, Jews, gays, fucking whites.” Of the other school shootings in Oregon and Kentucky he says, “Do not think we’re trying to copy anyone.” He and Dylan had the idea “before the first one ever happened.” Their plan is better, “not like those fucks in Kentucky with camouflage and .22s. Those kids were only trying to be accepted by others.”

  The result of their revenge, Dylan hopes, will be “the most deaths in U.S. history.”

  “Hopefully,” Eric adds, kissing the gun he holds in his arms and has named Arlene, in honor of a character in Doom.

  “We’re hoping, we’re hoping. I hope we kill 250 of you,” Dylan says.

  “If you’re going to go fucking psycho and kill a bunch of people like us . . . do it right,” Dylan says.

  In the lead up to the shootings, they tricked people. “I could convince them that I’m going to climb Mount Everest, or I have a twin brother growing out of my back,” Eric says. “I can make you believe anything.”

  “People have no clue,” Dylan says at one point.