I'm in (for the first two)Originally Posted by RBP
I'm in (for the first two)
You should. It's promoted as a comedy and it's more like dark satire. One of the true stories it was based on involved the real John Holmes out for a strange night with friends..
Roller Girl
And in and out and in and out for the last one?
I need a mood enhancer, I'm in a funk
Oh I finished that book Columbine and a bit of a follow up. Recommended reading for anyone interested. Really enjoyed the way the author structured the book. (10 years of interviews, accessing redacted and 'missing' police reports, correcting a slew of untruths initially created by the press).
Lance, we were chatting about the parents and possible accountability. How about this - Harris had a website where he made constant threats and oultined plans for hurting a lot of people. He also was creating home made bombs. One of his friends gained access to the site and reported it to the police. They wrote a warrant to search the Harris home and it was 'lost' and never filed.
Also, the police had a file on Harris because him and Klebold were placed into the Diversity program, which is like a juvie monitoring program for underage lawbreakers.
Very long one short - The police had access to written death threats from Harris. The parents of the friend who saw the site were aware of varying activities Harris committed like making pipe bombs and threatening their son.
Both Harris and Klebold wrote journals, one and two years respectively before the incident and they contained "we're gonna burn the whole world" sort of threats. These journals were hidden from the parents until the day of the massacre.
Harris in particular was considered a true psychopath (sociopath) by experts after examining his website, journal, video tapes, because of his ease in handling authority figures and telling them exactly what they wanted to hear each time he got into trouble. He would often simultaneously write in his own journal about how everyone was less intelligent than him and he would kill them all, as the professionals counseling him were giving glowing recommendations and support during his treatment. Harris was also on Zoloft first, and then Luvox for depression taking it right up to the day he died.
The book was excellent matching certain timelines and there is no question, the Jeffco police service was tagged for not releasing pages of reports that were filed previous to Columbine. One of them was the search warrant I spoke about above. Some of the victim's parents initially tried to sue the parents of Harris and Kelbold, then the school, and then finally the police involved at the time. It took over eight years and a change in police management before most of the truth was exposed.
My take after finishing the book is that the parents of Harris and Klebold were aware of things like vandalism and drinking. Because the boys said and did the right things when admitting and accepting responsibility for the the incidents, the parents weren't aware of the larger plan. Harris' Dad was a marine and spoke about keeping discipline in house so to speak, but always cooperated with the police when his son was in trouble. Klebold's journal was full of drawings of hearts throughout multiple pages and he talked about unrequited love often. He was angry at the world and also lonely to the point of wanting to kill himself. I felt really sorry for his parents after reading because on the surface their son was shy, unsure with girls, brilliant when it came to aptitude but didn't apply himself at school and got into the same sort of trouble most teens do at that age. Both sets of parents had no idea of the hidden mindset where especially Harris would say and write about killing everyone in the world, not any particular classmates.
A truly horrifying discovery was Harris wrote detailed plans about the attack and one official said - Columbine was a bombing that turned into a shooting later on. Their intent was to blow up the entire school and wait out in the parking lot to pick off anyone who made it out. Bomb experts said if any of the larger bombs worked (there were multiple), it would have likely brought the second floor down and killed the majority of the 2000 students in the ensuing explosions. Harris and Klebold had to improvise almost everything from the outset because their diversionary bomb outside didn't work as well as the larger bombs within.
Last edited by Hal-9000; 03-12-2019 at 04:11 PM.
fricnjay (03-12-2019), Teh One Who Knocks (03-12-2019)
My happy Columbine post should help with thatI need a mood enhancer, I'm in a funk
my timing isn't great, sorry dude
My happy Columbine post should help with that
It's okay
Hal-9000 (03-12-2019)
That was a tough read for me and I'm glad the author took a neutral stance on most issues. He was a reporter and then took ten years to write the book. The amount of research he did was incredible. He interviewed the school principal 50 times over eight years. He also went through thousands of pages of police files and quotes cataloguing numbers like 01-01987213-198623.
There were previous school shootings, but they were typically perpetrated by the single white male contingent. Columbine changed a lot of things, from gun sale rules to the way police and SWAT respond to school shootings to recognizing the signs before something like that happens. Good stat after Columbine about how many students at other schools told authorities about possible sketchy behavior from classmates and prevented incidents. There were at least two large events planned and the kids responsible arrested before anything happened. Police and psychologists figured out that in tandem with growing social media in the 2000's, most kids will 'leak' or tell someone about their intent before committing to it.
Teh One Who Knocks (03-12-2019)
What's sad though, like with Parkland, law enforcement played a big part in what happened. Had that warrant not been "lost" and they had executed it, the cops would have discovered all of this and possibly stopped the whole thing from happening. Just like the FBI and local LEO's dropped the ball with Parkland.
Hal-9000 (03-12-2019)
You know my wife was a high school lead counselor and is now working as a director at the admin level. Plus she is president of the Texas association for school counselors and she is making a big push for counselors and training to spot and deal with behavior that leads to violence before it gets that far.
This became apparent early in the book and was later on reinforced when you read all of the evidence the author eventually had access to. Harris was a brilliant kid, often admitting outright to any infractions he was caught doing and then saying exactly what was needed so he could overcome whatever punishment was given. Harris had planned on killing the world for at least two years before Columbine, there was no trigger or event that usually incites these types of shootings.
And yes. The police and SWAT teams came under fire for setting up their well know perimeter for over three hours there, rather than going in and addressing the situation. There are now three rules of engagement that start with - If shooters are active, go in immediately. Columbine started at 11:19 and ended at 12:06, yet one teacher bled out waiting over three hours on the floor in a classroom.
Don't get me wrong. During Parkland I thought the world came down a little hard on the school resource officer for not going in with just a handgun, but Pony explained to me that most handguns are just as fast as an AR-15 semi automatic. I still find that difficult to believe as I think the AR-15 is a faster, more powerful weapon. Someone in the military was quoted as saying even if you have a conceal and carry permit and witness something like happening, it's not a good idea to run into the school as a civilian with a gun because the authorities on site will likely shoot you. I know it would be a tough call for me as a bystander.
Faster? No, rate of fire is identical. More powerful? Depends. Any rifle is typically more "powerful" because the speed of the bullet is increased. But if you compare a large caliber handgun to a small caliber rifle? I dunno. What would do more damage? A small bullet traveling slower or a smaller one traveling fast?
Typically I would agree a civilian shouldn't run into a school to "hunt" a shooter. A trained, possible police resource officer is a different story, depending on all circumstances I think he should go in. An armed citizen, say a teacher also shouldn't go hunting through the school looking for a shooter but if the shooter enters the area (classroom,etc) and the teacher has the opportunity to safely take out the shooter they should absolutely do so.
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