More than 900 pages of writings, diagrams and drawings released Thursday add disturbing detail – but little significant new information – to the established account of how teenagers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold conceived and executed their deadly Columbine school shootings.
The newest batch of documents, released after initial objections of the killers’ families, covers a broad spectrum dating years prior to the April 20, 1999, suicidal attack that killed 12 other students and a teacher. It also renews the question of whether authorities should have acted more aggressively on behavioral red flags.
Wayne Harris’ spiral notebook provides a sketchy chronicle of sometimes futile attempts to resolve his son’s long-running conflicts with peers and authorities – but sheds little light on critics’ claims that he should have suspected a violent plot.
Venomous diatribes, an apparently tongue-in-cheek business plan casting the “Trench Coat Mafia” as a murder- for-hire protection racket and hateful screeds further describe Harris and Klebold’s worldview, while handwritten to-do lists check off chilling preparations for a massacre.
“It’ll be like the LA riots, the oklahoma bombing, WWII, vietnam, duke and doom all mixed together,” Harris wrote, alluding to his favorite computer games in one foreshadowing rant discovered on the family’s computer. “… I want to leave a lasting impression on the world.”
Wrote Klebold in a rambling “last will” found at his home: “What fun is life without a little death?”
The killers’ sometimes eloquent, sometimes spewing accounts came accompanied by diagrams illustrating the plan of attack and drawings of them sheathed with weapons. Some of the writings walked through previously explored fantasy scenarios, such as one in which Harris described an escape in which they would “hijack a hell of a lot of bombs and crash a plane into NYC.”
“There is so much hate, so much hate,” said Judy Brown, who, with her husband, Randy, has pressed to open all Columbine records. “It gets crazier and crazier as you read.”
But some of the documents reflect angst and insecurity stemming from more traditional teen concerns – like unrequited love.
“I have no happiness, no ambitions, no friends & no love,” penned a recently jilted Klebold.
“If you have time in your life to just sit down, relax, and talk with a guy who cares a lot about you … let me know,” wrote a smitten Harris, bracing for rejection. “If you don’t … just don’t say anything. I’ll understand, I’m used to it.”
Other pages underscore the teens’ love of violent video games, recount vaguely flirtatious online chats with unnamed females or provide glancing references that now appear to hold hints of the mayhem to come – such as the class assignment in which Harris pointed out loopholes in the “Brady bill” restricting sales of firearms.
In December 1997, Harris wrote an essay titled “Guns in School” in which he documented the ease with which students could obtain weapons and sneak them into school.
“Every day the news broadcasts stories of students shooting students, or going on killing sprees, or even just bringing a gun to school …” he wrote. “However, a school is no place for a gun.”
The new writings continue to reveal a pattern in the killers’ behavior, said John Nicoletti, a Denver-area police psychologist and author who has followed Columbine closely.
“In this case, obviously, Harris and Klebold did a lot of broadcasting,” Nicoletti said. “It’s what we call a practice session. It’s putting things together and obsessing about it – putting things in writing and getting braver.”
They harbored delusions of power, control, revenge and infamy – largely because of their failure to command respect, said Ron Walker, a former FBI profiler who has studied the Columbine documents.
“It’s overcompensation for the lack of esteem they have for themselves,” he said. “These issues of power, issues of control – which they really didn’t have – they wanted to exercise with this event they had planned.”
At times, both Harris and Klebold acknowledged their self- perception of weakness and hammered out profane prophecies on their computer keyboards.
“Everyone is always making fun of me because of how I look, how (expletive) weak I am and (expletive), well I will get you all back: ultimate (expletive) revenge here,” Harris wrote in November 1998.
“As of this date I have enough explosives to kill about 100 people, and then if I’d get a couple of bayonets, swords, axes, whatever I’ll be able to kill at least 10 more. and that just isn’t enough.”
The latest release followed a years-long court battle in which some victims’ families, as well as media outlets including The Denver Post, sought to make public materials withheld by the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office.
A court ruling in November left the question of release up to Sheriff Ted Mink, who reviewed the materials and used a “balancing test” to determine which would benefit the public.
Attorneys for the Harris and Klebold families, and The Post, recently came to an agreement that led to the release of the documents. The families’ lawyers could not be reached for comment.
Mink chose not to release the so-called basement tapes of Harris and Klebold recorded the night before the attack.
Labeling the tapes as “disturbing,” he said he was comfortable withholding material that could influence others to carry out future rampages or mass murders.
“We’ll save a life,” Mink said Thursday.
Dale Todd, a Columbine parent and party to the legal action that resulted in the release, said he hopes the additional documents help mental-health professionals learn how to detect and prevent future volatile situations.
“I think it’ll have a long-term effect,” said Todd, whose son Evan was injured in the attack. “Truth always rises, no matter how it’s crushed into the ground. You can’t crush the truth.”
Staff writer Kevin Simpson can be reached at 303-820-1739 or ksimpson@denverpost.com.
