Columbine High School Massacre

On April 20, 1999, two students — Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17 — carried out a mass shooting at Columbine High School in unincorporated Jefferson County, Colorado, near Littleton. [The attack killed 12 students and one teacher and wounded 24 others before both perpetrators died by suicide](https://apnews.com/article/columbine-shooting-anniversary-25-years-legacy). It was the deadliest school shooting in American history at that time and fundamentally transformed the national conversation about school safety, gun control, bullying, and media violence.

Harris and Klebold were both seniors at Columbine High School. They had been planning the attack for over a year, documenting their preparations in journals, videos recorded in the Harris family basement (later known as the "Basement Tapes"), and website posts. Their original plan was far more ambitious than a shooting: they had constructed two 20-pound propane bombs designed to detonate in the school cafeteria during the busiest lunch period, which would have potentially killed hundreds. When the bombs failed to detonate, Harris and Klebold proceeded with a shooting attack.

The attack began at approximately 11:19 AM. Harris and Klebold opened fire outside the school near the west entrance, killing Rachel Scott and injuring Richard Castaldo on the sidewalk. They moved through the school, shooting in hallways and the library, where the majority of the killing took place. In the library, they killed 10 students and wounded 12 others over approximately seven minutes. Teacher Dave Sanders was shot in the hallway while evacuating students and bled to death over approximately three hours while awaiting SWAT team entry.

[The law enforcement response became one of the most scrutinized aspects of the attack. Following the protocols of the time, officers established a perimeter and waited for SWAT teams rather than immediately entering the building](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47797021). This delay allowed the shooting to continue and contributed to Dave Sanders's death. The Columbine response directly led to a nationwide overhaul of active shooter protocols, replacing the "contain and wait" approach with the now-standard practice of immediate officer entry to confront the threat.

Harris and Klebold died by simultaneous self-inflicted gunshot wounds in the school library at approximately 12:08 PM.

[The aftermath of Columbine reshaped American culture and policy in profound ways. Schools across the country implemented lockdown drills, installed security cameras, and hired school resource officers](https://www.npr.org/2019/04/19/712920863/columbine-at-20-what-weve-learned). The tragedy prompted congressional hearings on gun violence and youth culture.

[The current consensus, based on the perpetrators' own writings and psychological evaluations, holds that Harris exhibited psychopathic traits and grandiose fantasies of destruction, while Klebold was severely depressed and suicidal. The attack was not primarily motivated by bullying, as early media narratives suggested, but rather by Harris's desire for notoriety and mass destruction](https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/apr/20/columbine-myths-reality-high-school-massacre).

Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold both died by suicide during the attack on April 20, 1999, precluding any criminal prosecution. Multiple civil lawsuits were filed by victims' families against the Harris and Klebold families, the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office, and others. [In 2001, the families of most victims reached settlements totaling $2.538 million from the Harris and Klebold families' homeowners' insurance](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47797021). Separate lawsuits against the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office were dismissed, as courts ruled that law enforcement had no specific duty to protect individual students. Lawsuits were also filed against gun show operators who had sold firearms to Robyn Anderson and against the Manes family. Mark Manes sold the TEC-DC9 pistol to Harris and Klebold and was sentenced to six years in prison for providing a handgun to a minor. Philip Duran, who introduced Harris and Klebold to Manes, was sentenced to four and a half years. [The Jefferson County Sheriff's Office faced criticism for failing to act on a 1998 complaint about Harris's website, which contained death threats, and for not executing a search warrant draft related to the complaint](https://apnews.com/article/columbine-shooting-anniversary-25-years-legacy).