Columbine (50 page)

One finger troubled him a little. His right pinkie jutted out away from the others, which caused a minor issue when he shook hands. It could poke the other person in the palm a little--just enough to signal that something was off. You could catch him glancing down there nervously, if you knew what to look for. It was not the first impression he wanted to make. But he had such a commanding presence once he spoke. Clients trusted him. His bosses were happy. He was becoming a star.

Patrick had retired the wheelchair and the crutch in high school. The foot brace remained. His right leg lagged behind a little: noticeable, but not debilitating. Running was out of the question, but water skis were not.

Balance, strength, and agility were all hurdles Patrick could overcome. But he would never regain the dexterity in his right foot to grip the ski. So he worked with an engineering friend to build a custom boot he could slip on as he tried to rise up on the water. They spent months working on prototypes and experimenting with them at the lake. John went with them for encouragement. Every time, the boat dragged Patrick uselessly behind.

They tried stripping the shell off a Rollerblade and adhering it to the ski. Nope. They refined it, and returned to the lake. Useless. Patrick tried over and over. He had made about ten runs that evening, and it was getting late. John was sure Patrick was exhausted, and thought it was time to break.
No, I can do this,
Patrick said.

John agreed. He sat in the passenger seat facing backward. The driver throttled the engine, and John watched his boy rise up onto the surface of the lake. Wow.

Patrick felt the spray pelt his face. The sun danced on the waves. The towrope jerked his arms. He dug in for a turn. A sheet of water shot up and sliced into his calf. It hurt, just a little. Ahhhhhh. The pain of competition. It felt great.

____

Everyone expected copycats. The country braced for a new level of horror. School shooting deaths actually dropped 25 percent over the next three years. But Eric and Dylan gave young eyes a fresh approach: terrorist tactics for personal aggrandizement. In 2001, a pair of ninth graders at a Fort Collins, Colorado, middle school procured a similar arsenal: TEC-9, shotgun, rifles, and propane bombs. They planned to reverse Eric's chronology: seal off exits, mow down students, and save the bombs for stragglers. They would finish by taking ten hostages, holding them in the counseling office for fun, then killing the kids and themselves.

But they leaked. Kids nearly always leak. The bigger the plot, the wider the leakage. The Fort Collins pair went recruiting for gunmen to cover all the exits. One of the plotters told at least seven people that he planned to "redo Columbine." He bragged to four girls that they would be the first to die. They went straight to the police.

Teen peers were different after 1999. "Jokes" scared the crap out of kids. Two more grandiose plots--in Malcolm, Nebraska, and Oaklyn, New Jersey--were foiled in the first five years.

School administrators around the country responded with "zero tolerance"--meaning every idle threat was treated like a cocked gun. That drove everyone crazy. Nearly all supposed killers turned out to be kids blowing off steam. It wasn't working for anyone.

A pair of government how-to guides helped. The FBI and the Secret Service each published reports in the first three years, guiding faculty to identify serious threats. The central recommendations contradicted prevailing post-Columbine behavior. They said identifying outcasts as threats is not healthy. It demonizes innocent kids who are already struggling.

It is also unproductive. Oddballs are not the problem. They do not fit the profile.
There is no profile.

All the recent school shooters shared exactly one trait: 100 percent male. (Since the study a few have been female.) Aside from personal experience, no other characteristic hit 50 percent, not even close. "There is no accurate or useful 'profile' of attackers," the Secret Service said. Attackers came from all ethnic, economic, and social classes. The bulk came from solid two-parent homes. Most had no criminal record or history of violence.

The two biggest myths were that shooters were loners and that they "snapped." A staggering 93 percent planned their attack in advance. "The path toward violence is an evolutionary one, with signposts along the way," the FBI report said.

Cultural influences also appeared weak. Only a quarter were interested in violent movies, half that number in video games--probably below average for teen boys.

Most perps shared a crucial experience: 98 percent had suffered a loss or failure they perceived as serious--anything from getting fired to blowing a test or getting dumped. Of course, everyone suffers loss and failure, but for these kids, the trauma seemed to set anger in motion. This was certainly true in Columbine: Dylan viewed his entire life as failure, and Eric's arrest accelerated his anger.

So what should adults look for? First and foremost, advance confessions: 81 percent of shooters had confided their intentions. More than half told at least two people. Most threats are idle, though; the key is specificity. Vague, implied, and implausible threats are low-risk. The danger skyrockets when threats are direct and specific, identify a motive, and indicate work performed to carry it out. Melodramatic outbursts do
not
increase the risk.

A subtler form of leakage is preoccupation with death, destruction, and violence. A graphic mutilation story might be an early warning sign--or a vivid imagination. Add malice, brutality, and an unrepentant hero, and concern should rise. Don't overreact to a single story or drawing, the FBI warned. Normal teen boys enjoy violence and are fascinated with the macabre. "Writings and drawings on these themes can be a reflection of a harmless but rich and creative fantasy life," the report said. The key was repetition leading to obsession. The Bureau described a boy who'd worked guns and violence into every assignment. In home ec class he'd baked a cake in the shape of a gun.

The FBI compiled a specific list of warning signs, including symptoms of both psychopathy and depression: manipulation, intolerance, superiority, narcissism, alienation, rigidity, lethargy, dehumanization of others, and externalizing blame. It was a daunting list--that's a small excerpt. Few teachers were going to master it. The FBI recommended against trying. It suggested one person per school be trained intensely, for all faculty and administrators to turn to.

The FBI added one final caution: a kid matching most of its warning signs was more likely to be suffering from depression or mental illness than planning an attack. Most kids matching the criteria needed help, not incarceration.

____

Columbine also changed police response to attacks. No more perimeters. A national task force was organized to develop a new plan. In 2003, it released "The Active Shooter Protocol." The gist was simple: If the shooter seems active, storm the building. Move toward the sound of gunfire. Disregard even victims. There is one objective: Neutralize the shooters. Stop them or kill them.

The concept had been around for years but had been rejected. Pre-Columbine, cops had been exhorted to proceed cautiously: secure the perimeter, get the gunman talking, wait for the SWAT team.

The key to the new protocol was
active
. Most shootings--the vast majority--were labeled passive: the gunman was alive but not firing. Those cases reverted to the old protocol. Success depended on accurately determining the threat in the first moments.

Officers face a second decision point when they reach the shooters. If the killer is holed up in a classroom, holding kids but not firing, responders may need to stop there and use traditional hostage techniques. Storming the classroom could provoke the gunman. But if the shooter is firing, even just periodically, move in.

The active shooter protocol gained quick and widespread acceptance. In a series of shootings over the next decade, including the worst disaster, at Virginia Tech, cops or guards rushed in, stopped shooters, and saved lives.

____

Sue Petrone asked for and received the two sidewalk blocks her son Danny died on. They were jackhammered out of the ground and installed in her backyard, in the shadow of a fragrant spruce tree. Around the slab, she created a rock garden, with two big wooden tubs overflowing with petunias. She had a sturdy oak truss constructed over the slab, and a porch swing suspended from the crossbeam. She and Rich and their shaggy little dog can nestle comfortably into the generous swing.

Linda Sanders kept the Advil tablet found near Dave's body. He had trouble with knee swelling, so he always carried one in his pocket. Just one. She took his bloody clothes, a swath of carpet from under his head, a little fragment of tooth that chipped off when he fell, and his glasses.

She would never let those glasses go. She snapped them into an eyeglass case and placed them on the nightstand by her bed. She intends to leave them that way forever.

The lawsuit on behalf of Dave Sanders outlived all the others, but his widow chose not to take part. She was not angry at the police, or the school, or the parents. She was angry at her situation. She was lonely.

50. The Basement Tapes

E
ric wanted to be remembered. He spent a year on "The Book of God," but five weeks before Judgment Day, he decided that wasn't good enough. He wanted a starring role on-camera. So on March 15, he and Dylan began the Basement Tapes. It would be a tight shooting schedule, with no time for editing or postproduction. They filmed with a Sony 8mm camcorder, checked out from the Columbine High video lab.

The first installment was a basic talk-show setup: a stationary camera in the family room in Eric's basement, outside his bedroom. He continued making camera adjustments after he was rolling--perhaps as a sneaky way to ensure his audience would be clear on the director. The video project was entirely about his audience. Ultimately, the attack was, too.

Eric joined Dylan on-set. They kicked back in plush velvet recliners, bantering about the big event. Eric had a bottle of Jack Daniel's in one hand and Arlene laid across his lap. He took a swig and tried not to grimace. He hated the stuff. Dylan munched on a toothpick and took little sips of Jack as well.

They ranted for more than an hour. Dylan was wild and animated and angry, obsessively hurling his fingers through his long, ratty hair. Eric was mostly calm and controlled. They spoke with one voice: Eric's.

Eric introduced most ideas; Dylan riffed along. They insulted the usual inferiors: blacks, Latinos, gays, and women. "Yes, moms, stay home," Eric said. "Fucking make me dinner, bitch!"

Sometimes, Eric got kind of loud. That made Dylan nervous. It was after 1:00
A.M.
, and Eric's parents were upstairs, snoozing away. Careful, Dylan warned.

They rattled off a list of kids who'd pissed them off. Eric had been dragged across the country: the scrawny little white guy, constantly starting over, always at the bottom of the food chain. People kept making fun of him--"my face, my hair, my shirts." He enumerated every girl who had refused his advances.

Dylan got fired up just listening. He faced the camera and addressed his tormenters. "If you could see all the anger I've stored over the past four fucking years," he said. He described a sophomore who didn't deserve the jaw evolution gave him. "Look for his jaw," Dylan said. "It won't be on his body."

Eric named one guy he planned to shoot in the balls, another in the face. "I imagine I will be shot in the head by a fucking cop," he said.

No one they named would be killed.

It went back so much further than high school. From prekindergarten, at Foothills Day Care center, Dylan could remember them: all the stuck-up toddlers sneering at him. "Being shy didn't help," he said. At home it was just as bad. Except for his parents, his whole extended family looked down on him, treated him like the runt of the litter. His brother was always ripping on him; Byron's friends, too. "You made me what I am," Dylan said. "You added to the rage."

"More rage, more rage!" Eric demanded. He motioned with his arms. "Keep building it."

Dylan hurled another Ericism: "I've narrowed it down. It's humans I hate."

Eric raised Arlene, and aimed her at the camera. "You guys will all die, and it will be fucking soon," he said. "You all need to die. We need to die, too."

The boys made it clear, repeatedly, that they planned to die in battle. Their legacy would live. "We're going to kick-start a revolution," Eric said. "I declared war on the human race and war is what it is."

He apologized to his mom. "I really am sorry about this, but war's war," he told her. "My mother, she's so thoughtful. She helps out in so many ways." She brought him candy when he was sad, and sometimes Slim Jims. He said his dad was great, too.

Eric grew quiet. He said his parents had probably noticed him withdrawing. That was intentional--he was doing it to help them. "I don't want to spend any more time with them," he said. "I wish they were out of town so I didn't have to look at them and bond more."