The other day I finished reading Dave Cullen's
book «Columbine» (in my country the book was published under the title
«Columbine - an exhaustive report from the scene». The second, supplemented
edition of this book was published back in 2016, but in my country it was not
published until the end of 2023).
For all those who are seriously interested in
the Columbine tragedy and school massacres in general, I would recommend
reading this book. Such books are very rare today, its author has done a
tremendous job (according to his statement, the collection, verification and
systematization of materials for the book took him almost 10 years), combining
in one publication a large number of facts «from the first person». Everything
is here: testimonies of direct participants and other witnesses, data from
police and court reports, conclusions of criminalists, psychiatrists and other
experts. The book reconstructs a detailed chronology of events, along parallel
time lines (perpetrators, victims, eyewitnesses, police). There are quotes from
the perpetrators' diaries, their plans and plotting, transcripts of “basement
videotapes” and a lot of other useful information.
Another (in my opinion) plus of the book is
that Cullen, does not take the bad example of many other authors who first give
their version of the event, and then begin to adjust the facts under it, while
indicating only what corresponds to their interpretation, ignoring everything
in it does not fit. Here, the author puts only facts, and from all participants
of the tragedy, as if offering readers to see the tragedy through their eyes,
from the position of the perpetrator, victim, student or teacher, parent,
police officer, FBI agent, journalist, ambulance doctor, firefighter, just a
random onlooker, and then, on their basis, to draw their own conclusions. In
general, my impression of the book, only positive, it is a good solid work, a
real criminal journalist, with a competent and interesting form of presentation
of material.
For those who are interested in a personal
analysis of school shooters (including the Columbine killers) - I would
recommend Dr. Peter Langman's book «Why Kids Kill». There he provides an
objective comparative analysis of the most notorious «school shooters» by
psychological and forensic measures. Once again confirming the theory,
previously repeatedly expressed by various criminologists and law enforcement
agencies that there is no single psychotype of «school shooter», as well as
some unique personality traits inherent only to them, and they have more
differences than common. Therefore, all attempts to identify them at an early
stage and predict their emergence are «Sisyphean labor» that wastes a lot of
resources, but is of no practical use.
However, let's return to the main question -
Why exactly «Columbine» has become a nominal name for crimes of this kind? I
have long been involved in applied criminology, in terms of ensuring the safety
of schools, other educational institutions and places where children are
present in large numbers. This is the main topic of my research. Often in
discussions with my colleagues, the question has been raised that, if we put
aside the moral and ethical component and consider this crime from a purely
formal point of view, at first glance there is nothing particularly outstanding
in it. Both before and after it there were tragedies, more bloody in their
scale and consequences (those who are interested in the statistics of such crimes
can see here), and yet why «Columbine»?
Probably, because at detailed study of the
facts, it becomes clear that if the plan (and the crime was carefully planned)
of the criminals was executed by them in the original scenario, it would have
been a terrorist attack on a scale comparable to the tragedy in the school of Beslan in 2004 or «September 11». In
Chapter 8 of «Maximum Human Concentration» - Dave Cullen's book – «Columbine.
An Exhaustive Report from the Field.» (supplemented 2016 edition) describes in
detail the plan of the criminals, the number of bombs, their charge, striking
elements, their purpose (to hit large crowds of people, to distract attention,
to hit the emergency workers and journalists who arrived on the scene, to
collapse the building and ignite it). The following are indicated: prepared
sectors for firing, main and reserve firing points formed taking into account
the direction of movement of people during evacuation.
In total, the plan had three stages of
realization of the criminals' plan, and if they had managed to realize not all
of it, but at least most of it, the number of victims, with a high degree of
probability, would have been four-digit. According to experts (including
myself, I personally asked people who served in anti-terrorist and
intelligence-sabotage units), this plan was drawn up at a good professional
level. It takes into account many important factors and conditions, and there
are, of course, shortcomings, but not critical. The most important conclusion
of their experts was that this plan was quite suitable for real implementation.
The fact that this plan was not realized in practice, happened rather by
accident, first - the technique failed, most of the detonators installed on the
most destructive bombs did not work, the second - the lack of the killers of
the backup scenario for such a case and as a result of the lack of coordination
of their actions. In fact, what happened as a result was an unplanned
improvisation on the part of the perpetrators, but even with this development
of events - 27 victims (13 killed, 14 wounded).
My opinion is that the events at Columbine High School have clearly demonstrated
that the threat level of the School Shooters is underestimated. Two ordinary
teenagers, spent a year hatching a plan for large scale mass murder, procuring
weapons, ammunition, bomb parts, planning, discussing, practicing. They didn't
just talk, they acted.
This begs the questions: did no one see
anything, or understand? Or did they see, but didn't want to understand? Or
maybe they saw understood, and even with these thoughts came to their
superiors, but heard: «Do not exaggerate, it's just teenagers, what can they do
at all, at most write an obscene phrase on the door of the director's office.
Go and do something serious, and forget about your fantasies and do not tell
anyone...».
However, as it turned out - they can, and can
much more than what is expected of them. Cold-bloodedly and calculatingly make
a plan to deprive hundreds, and maybe thousands, of the lives and health of
their classmates, teachers, friends, neighbors or just acquaintances, and then
try to carry it out. If they hadn't been let down by homemade detonators, they
would have done it. Simple teenagers from the backwoods, were ready to kill
hundreds and thousands of innocent people, if their plan had succeeded, the
terrorists from «Al-Qaeda», against their background would look like a bunch of
petty hooligans.
The events at Columbine High School
showed the main thing: children, in their desire to kill their own kind, are
able to show great analytical abilities in planning, and in the implementation
of their plans, the level of cruelty and danger, far surpass adults. Outwardly
normal teenagers are capable of killing without the slightest reason or
compassion. Except that we still don't want to recognize this. That is why
every year in schools, kindergartens, colleges and universities shots and
explosions rumble, knives and axes take a deadly swing, incendiary devices and
atomizers detonate, children and adults die.
And someone continues to say that «There is no
need to exaggerate and exaggerate, these are just teenagers, what can they
do...».
Author - Roman Grishin
photo from the website: Chalkbeat
#Columbine #School #facts #thoughts #questions #tragedy
#murder #crime #shooter #threat
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