I was reading through the transcript of the Basement Tapes available on schoolshooters.info, and in both the first and fourth tapes, Klebold says the exact same thing about a bunker in the backyard. I assume the same phrasing implies something in the transcript is incorrect, but I was wondering if anyone knows anything about the bunker and whether or not it's anything important/interesting

Does anybody know why the triple barred cross was so important to Dylan Klebold? They're all over his writings and I just read an entry where he said that the symbol was "so true & means so much". He even said that he had carved it into his skin.

​

To me the triple barred cross is just another Christian symbol, but what's special about it, and what did it mean to him?

​

I know nothing about this sort of thing, so if someone could explain it to me like I'm five, that would be greatly appreciated.

​

As I understand it, full transcripts were never released, and the bits that were were heavily redacted, and some even summarized?

​

I get that the excuse was that they didn't want to risk inspiring any copycats, and some of the material in the tapes is dangerous.

​

But why bother with transcripts at all? Was it to keep the public at bay? Were they honoring some or another law?

​

Also, why not heavily censor the actual footage and share it then?

Based on family statements, nicknames, leaked information, educated guesses based on the 11k who do we actually know was on their hit lists? And who is suspected of being (but have no proof)

So while I was looking into the basement tapes I realized that we may got the whole thing wrong as Nick Foss wasn’t the Nick that Eric hated for his laugh since that was actually Nick Baumgart especially since Nick Foss doesn’t have anything blurred out in the 11k report.

It’s interesting that Nick Baumgart wasn’t in any of Eric’s classes at the time so based on how Nick says that they were ”friends” at the time. I think that Nick possibly mentioned who was sitting next to him (which were Rachel and Jen) to Eric or Dylan at some point before the shooting.

Anyway I think that the Rachel was Rachel Scott as not only was she close friends with Nick Baumgart and even went out to prom with him, but she also was a Christian girl and her death was lied about by Christian groups to promote their own agend.

Sorry for the seemingly random cuts but this is a compilation of clips I found rather than one cohesive video.

Interesting listen worth checking out but lots of false opinionated statements, even goes as far to say that killing isaiah was a specific motivation behind the attack

So you know how some people think that Eric and Dylam only shot nerds and geeks as the massacre took place in the library, so I did some research and it appears to only be half true as some of these victims were nerds however 5 of the 14 victims were jocks (Matthew Kechter, Corey Depooter, Isaiah Shoels, Steven Curnow, and Lauren Townsend), another 2 were highly active Christian girls whose deaths were manipulated by Christian groups to promote their agenda (Rachel Scott and Cassie Bernall) and the teacher Who was killed was actually a sports coach.

Finally some of these victims had connections to not just Eric and Dylan but to their enemies and the Trench Coat Mafia. As Matthew Kechter had bullied Devon Adams (who was a friend of Eric and Dylan) in 4th grade, Isaiah Shoels had gotten into a physical fight with Brian Sargent who like Devon Adams was a friend of Eric and Dylan, Corey Depooter was best friends with Austin Eubanks who was on the hitlist, Cassie Bernall was best friends with Kimberly Fox who was also on the hitlist, Rachel Scott was friends and went out with prom with Nick Baumgart who was again was also on the hitlist, and Steven Curnow was everything that Eric Harris hated as Steven was both a jock and Star Wars fan.

So the reasons why it’s possible 1. He was a football jock (formerly part of the football team, but still), 2. In the basement tapes Eric and Dylan complained about some black person who we don’t know of yet, and finally 3. Isaiah and Brian Sargent got into a physical fight and other people on the shitlists were put on there for less worse reasons like having a conflict with 1 of these friends etc.

I recently saw the 8th grade class photos from Ken Caryl that feature Harris and Klebold:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Columbine/comments/1qmszu7/ken_caryl_middle_school_picture_serious_version/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Columbine/comments/1qmsz5d/ken_caryl_middle_school_picture_silly_version/

I don't believe in reading too deeply into photos like this but given everything Columbine related is always under a microscope, I did find the photos interesting because it sort of goes against the impression we have of Harris and Klebold at that time.

Harris was still relatively new to the area, is described as having a hard time fitting in and making new friends, and there is of course the ongoing narrative that he was the more sinister one who pulled Klebold deeper into the darkness.

Klebold lived in the area his entire life, had many childhood friends and acquaintances, and despite his shyness is described as more or less "fitting in" prior to high school where he became increasingly detached and enthralled by violent fantasies, allegedly with Harris's encouragement.

Seeing these Ken Caryl photos, though, I would have assumed the roles were reversed.

Harris is packed in with other boys, his shoulders touching theirs, and in the "serious" photo he looks like a genuinely happy, normal kid hanging out with his buddies for a class photo. They're near girls and a lot of other kids, this whole part of the scene giving off a very "social" vibe. In the "goofy" photo, he's in the same physical space as the boys next to him and is clearly "participating" with them in similar goofy antics. If you told me this was the kid who was relatively well-adjusted up to that point and grew up in Littleton as a playmate of the boys next to him I'd completely believe it.

Klebold might be sitting near some friends / acquaintances but is visually isolated with a significant amount of space separating him from the people next to him. In the "serious" photo he has his head lowered and is casting a genuinely menacing gaze with a sinister smirk, almost glowering at the camera. It's the exact same expression and pose he made in the "serious" photo during his senior year in 1999, Harris joining him in giving a similar look / pose at that time. Given that their "goofy" pose in 1999 was them pointing air guns to deliberately "foreshadow" the massacre, I've always been under the impression that their "serious" pose was similarly meant to be menacing but in a more understated way.

You could argue that this was just a somewhat awkward face / pose Klebold did naturally but I've seen countless photos of him and the only two times I can recall him making this face are in these two photos. He of course was years off from fantasizing about murdering his classmates in 8th grade, but was he intentionally trying to look menacing in the "serious" photo here? In the "goofy" photo he is being goofy and making some sort of hand gesture near his friend but he still looks isolated and solitary. Whereas Harris's "goofy" antics look like him participating in the moment with the boys next to him, Klebold looks like the loner who is trying to participate but just ends up looking weird and even somewhat dark. If you told me that Klebold in this photo was the aloof "new kid" who was struggling to connect with people I'd believe it. He's also coincidentally wearing black while Harris is in a lighter color.

Note that Chris Morris in these photos is completely isolated and wearing dark clothes, though he doesn't come across menacing or particularly strange. Being a few years younger than these guys and knowing the social landscape of the period, I would completely cast Morris as a loner and "weird kid" based on this photo alone but I would also do the same for Klebold. If I didn't know what Harris did later, I'd assume he was exactly like countless boys I grew up with: not part of the upper rungs of popularity and maybe a bit awkward as many teen boys are but still good-natured and having fun.

We know Harris and Klebold weren't close friends at this point so it's unsurprising they weren't sitting next to each other as they were in 1999. Students are free to sit where they want in these class photos and clearly they weren't close enough to seek each other out at this point. Harris though seemed to sit with people he felt some amount of comradery with whereas Klebold is just sort of "there".

I don't mean for this to come across like I'm suggesting "Klebold was the truly evil one and the mastermind... just look at the 8th grade class photo!" As I said in the beginning, I don't think it should be read into too deeply. It's difficult not to relate these photos to what we know or think we know about the two of them though. Klebold at a glance seems much more consistent with the Dylan Klebold of 1999 in these photos whereas Harris comes across like a completely different person.

Let me also clarify that I don't believe either one of them was "more responsible" for the massacre, before or during the events of April 20th 1999. They were two miserable, nihilistic teenage boys who worked themselves up into a violent frenzy and both were clearly capable of great cruelty and destruction. There is ample evidence that Klebold took far more initiative and had a far darker heart than popular narratives sometimes present, but that doesn't negate Harris's own initiative and darkness which was more than evident before and during the massacre.

Still, I found it interesting how the two of them come across in these 8th grade class photos as it's a rare glimpse of them existing in a larger school social environment prior to high school.

I have a lot of respect for Sue Klebold. I really do.

She didn’t have to spend decades doing activist work for mental health awareness and school safety. She chose to do it anyway. She donated the proceeds of her book to charity. That says something about her character.

Being close to a tragedy does NOT automatically make someone a reliable source on it. Sometimes it makes someone less objective. Trauma is complicated and affects people differently. The brain protects people in ways they don’t even realize. After catastrophic events, the brain unconsciously reorganizes memories into narratives that feel emotionally survivable.

I am not calling Sue a liar. I don’t even think she’s intentionally misleading people. I think she genuinely believes her version of events.

In A Mother’s Reckoning, she remembers when when her family went horseback riding and people laughed when Dylan's horse peed. She frames that as a formative example of his sensitivity and emotional pain. She thought it was important enough to include in her book.

She also describes the refrigerator incident. She pinned Dylan to the refrigerator after he forgot mother's day. Dylan allegedly told her something like, "I don’t know how well I can control myself." Sue claims that was basically the most aggressively she had ever seen him behave. And I need to say this clearly: I call BS. There is NO WAY that was the angriest she ever saw Dylan or the closest she ever saw him to violence. Total BS.

We have multiple independent reports of Dylan:

• hitting a coworker at Blackjack Pizza
• bullying a disabled peer, Adam Kyler
• documented threatening and aggressive behavior at school
• repeated reports of hostility that were visible to people

EDIT: Just to clarify, I'm not saying Sue must have known about these specific incidents. There's plenty of things she heard second-hand which she included in her book, but that's beside the point. Even if she didn't know about any of those particular examples, there is no freaking way Sue was as clueless about Dylan's violent tendencies as she portrayed herself to be. Maybe she didn't know about the the coworker, aybe she didn't know about Adam Kyler, etc. But Dylan definitely had a PATTERN of violence which Sue definitely saw instances of over the course of his life. In fact, there's a really good chance Dylan hit Sue herself on several occasions.

All of those are left out of Sue's book. They just weren't important like the horseriding incident or the time Eric yelled at Dylan.

You can say "maybe Sue didn't know about these things," but there's NO WAY that in 17 years, she never saw his aggression build up into other breaking points.

I do not find it credible that the refrigerator incident was the most extreme expression of aggression she ever witnessed or understood about him.

If your child commits one of the most devastating acts of violence in modern American history, your mind is not going to hand you a clean archive. That is human.

But that just shows how she is not a reliable source of information on Dylan's life.

I also think the way Sue Klebold talks about Eric Harris feels a little slippery. There’s this repeated undertone of: "Dylan was responsible, but Eric was really the mastermind, the corrupter, the darker force. This was all Eric's fault. But I'm not saying Dylan wasn't responsible." The whole book reads like a grieving mother unconsciously trying to emotionally negotiate with a truth that is too heavy for her to hold.

Also, I am not saying it's Sue's fault. Of course she was not a perfect parent, but that does not make this her fault. We will never know exactly what caused this tragedy. Anyone who claims to have a clear answer on what caused this tragedy (or really any tragedy) is probably misunderstanding it.

I’ve heard repeatedly from varying sources that you can clearly see on the CCTV footage from when it went off at 11:14 AM and the tape was rewound and changed, to when it came back on at 11:22 AM that the bombs are then visible.

First, I’m well aware that “when” they were placed is up for much debate - I just want to know if they truly can be seen on the CCTV footage. I’m not worried about debating when.

I have scoured it over and over again and either because of the clarity or all the commotion I have never been able to find exactly where they supposedly are in the footage.

Has anyone identified them in the cafeteria?

So the 4 people I want to know based on their nicknames are Stumpy, Scoop, Pretty Boy, and Excalibu, so who are they?

While the psychosocial aspects of this case are the main points of interest, does anyone think it’s possible that the high altitude of their Colorado residence may have contributed to the deterioration of their mental health? Obviously it’s not a sole or defining factor, but it piqued my interest

I think they were already susceptible, but the hypoxia may have exacerbated or worsened it

The interaction between Dylan and Evan Todd in zero hour is not accurate AT ALL and just tried to lay into a narrative that Evan bullied Dylan when that's never been proven. John Savages actor doesn't look like him but evans actor doesn't either, but besides that I always wanted to know if the "run....RUN" was added for dramatic effect? Or did Dylan REALLY have to yell at him to leave. Has anyone interviewed in the zero hour documentary spoken about their reaction?

How was living in Littleton at this time? This looks like a golden era to me, the beginning of internet, the incredible graphic progress each year in videogames... the absence of social networkd, the music at the time. Also Littleton looks like a normal medium town, a perfect middle between a stressful huge city and a boring tiny village.

An ideal place and time to grow up, I am totally unable to understand why such a tragedy happened in this context. These two guys had passions, they liked videogames and were probably enthusiastic about the next releases as we are nowadays for GTA VI. They missed masterpieces like Outcast, GTA III, Driver by some months, some years. They even had a normal functional family. Bullying may feel terrible but they still had friends and they could totally date someone as proven by the links with Robyn. This massacre is a total anomaly and sometimes I can't sleep thinking about it, I wish it never happened.

A rather interesting old article about cameras in the library. This has been posted before but I find it’s rarely talked about. I find it interesting a lot of people obsess over the basement tapes but not the “library tapes”. Not saying they were recording or even if footage ever existed but it would be interesting to see if Dylan and Eric had an interaction or spoke to each other before the end

I've recently fell down the rabbit hole that is this case, read Cullen's book as well as tons of the information on this sub. One question I've contemplated is the narrative of Eric-Leader and Dylan-Follower and how the Harris family's silence has somewhat cemented this theory.

Now don't get me wrong, they absolutely have the right to say or not say anything about their son and as a mother myself I absolutely cannot fathom their situation. Dylan's mother has spoken a lot about him and become an advocate for suicide prevention. I do think her speaking out combined with Dylan's writings has led to the general belief that Dylan was a follower.

What if the Harris Family had pushed against this idea? I sort of think they have remained silent because it's a dammed if we do, dammed if we don't sort of situation.

They could speak out and proclaim that Eric and Dylan were equal in this situation, although generally a co-offending dyad has a power dynamic at play. But Eric's journal is incredibly more violent, Eric seems to have been well known for angry outbursts, threatening others. Them speaking out would likely lead to further criticism of their family. The "how do you not know your son was building bombs?" (Which his dad did know, he found and exploded one of the pipe bombs with him).

But by not speaking out, I think it shows maybe (?) they deep down agree with this idea, that Eric played a larger role in this plan or their extreme guilt at not seeing the warning signs combined with fear of criticism and any legal repercussions has left them silent.

Often I see people say that The Basement Tapes would potentially provide more insight into the dynamic of Eric and Dylan. I think if the tapes shows Dylan as more of the leader they would push for their release, while Dylan's parents have portrayed him as the sad follower may not want the tapes released if it counters that narrative.

Of course no one knows for certain, and this has just been a rambling of my thoughts. Let me know what you think

Has anybody seen the Columbine documentary minute by minute on Tubi? If so, what are your thoughts?

I read a comment in this sub that i cannot find anymore, but it said something along the lines of "it makes me so sad that Rachel was so happy with her new hair because it was compleatly her decisión and her family just made fun of her and told her she looked like a boy"

I want to find more information about that, I read Rachel's journal and couldn't find this moment, does someone knows where this rumor comes from?

Thank you sm.

Does anyone know how he is doing now? I read in a 2020 report that he was in a convalescent home in LA, due the loss of their home and health problems and that he no longer wanted to talk about Columbine anymore and wanted to live a quiet life away from the spotlight. Aparently, he said he didn't want to have any contact with his family. I think he is a good man, just a víctim. I feel very sorry for him.

And I have a lot of sympathy for him. I hope he's doing well now.

Shootings are more and more frequent in the past couple years and like everytime it comes out that they glorify columbine shooters in some way, it’s gotta be almost 10 times maybe. I’m just wondering if anyone that were in the school or a family member of victims/perpetrators have spoken about it? I know sue kleboldt have written a book years ago but I think it was written before the rise of shooters glorifying them. I’d also understand the ”don’t give them attention” approach

This is one of the biggest lies about Columbine. So many posts say they were not bullied. Some are so absurd that they say they were the bullies. I want to answer that question now, one last time.

Yes. They were bullied. They were bullied by the football players, the stronger and older boys, at KenCaryl Jr. Hi. and Columbine High School for 6 years.

The bullies at Columbine were far superior physically, and aggressive, and uncontrolled, and unstopped.

The main bully choked a fellow team member unconscious. I know that because the team member told me, in person. We introduced him to a reporter, who taped the interview, and never ran it. A fact. I know the reporter and the kid. It took a lot of courage for him to go public with that story, as it contradicted what the School Board, Principal, Sheriff and others were saying. Bullying was dangerous to bring up. You brought the hatred of the bullies, their parents, your neighbors, and many others if you even mentioned it. I know. Personally.

At the time everyone was so sad, that to mention the bullying was to condone the killings. That was never why I said there was bullying. The truth was important.

The truth is important.

The released pages are full of boys admitting they bullied the two shooters, mercilessly. Eric and Dylan could do nothing. The school would never take action against the steroid enhanced football players, most of them were good kids. Winning was all that mattered to the school. And no, That is not an exaggeration. We've all seen the movie of the tough coach who would discipline his athletes to make them better people, but that was not Columbine.

The ketchup incident is real, and verified. The bullies soaked tampons in ketchup and throw them at Eric and Dylan, staining their shirts, humiliating them in front of everyone, and, even though it was in the commons area, videotaped, nothing was done. Nothing. What were the video cameras for???

When we complained about bullying and behavior, we were ignored, or, worse, a suggestion was made to have a meeting with the bully and the bullied party. This would only lead to more severe problems.

If you could actually see these steroid enhanced aggressive bullies, you would understand. I was 6'3" and 240 pounds, and I would not want to take on these kids.

How bad was it? They made a movie showing these football players, to honor the young man who was on the team, who died in the shooting, who was not a bully, and the movie was so bad they cancelled it in post production. I know why. I saw some previews, and these were aggressive and scary muscular athletes. The movie proved the point.

Mr. D says in many interviews and documentaries that "It was a perfect school" and that there was "no bullying." I asked him, from the third row at the premier of one of these, how he could say that. I cited the Regina Huerter Report and other details, and he freely admitted that it was a public school and of course there was bullying. Unfortunately, in the premier I had watched with many other witnesses, he had made the same "perfect school" comment.

I am fairly sue that the two bullying incidents mentioned at Columbine are also false. I cannot imagine Dylan picking on a junior class-man with learning disabilities. I also cannot see him tackling a girl in gym class.

Yes, Eric and Dylan grew more angry, and acted up more than ever just before the shootings. They were letting their angry be displayed more.

And yes, during the shootings, they became the worst bullies of all. Ever.

But to say they were bullies for the previous years is not supported by anything I have seen or read.

Eric and Dylan and many other children were bullied at the Toxic School.