— which would apply the new restrictions to the gun used in the Boulder attack — passed the House 36-28 on Monday. The bill’s Senate sponsors next will move to accept changes made in the House and then send the bill to Gov. Jared Polis.

The governor is expected to sign the measure. At Polis’ behest, lawmakers agreed to weaken the bill’s initial intent of fully banning the sale or purchase of the targeted weapons, unless they were altered to have a fixed magazine — meaning that they could not be reloaded as rapidly.

Still, the measure represents the strongest gun-control legislation passed by Colorado lawmakers since they began undertaking firearm regulation in earnest more than a decade ago.

The bill, which would take effect Aug. 1, 2026, broadly would prohibit the sale, purchase or transfer of gas-operated, semiautomatic firearms that accept detachable magazines — a definition that captures most firearms colloquially known as assault weapons.

Under the bill, the guns could still be purchased by people who’ve passed a background check and completed a training course. The legislation does not ban the possession of any weapon, and it would not apply to common pistols and shotguns. It also exempts , some of which are used for hunting.

The restrictions would apply to the gas-operated pistol used by the King Soopers shooter in March 2021. It would also cover the weapons used in the December 2021 Lakewood and Denver shooting spree; the 2012 Aurora movie theater shooting; and some of those used in the 1999 Columbine High School shooting.

The bill’s sponsors — Democratic Reps. Andy Boesenecker and Meg Froelich — said the bill regulates weapons with a “unique lethality” that have been used in mass shootings across Colorado and the United States.

“A generation after Columbine — (a time) of active shooter drills, of lived experience of mass shootings — you bet I have emotions,” Froelich, an Englewood legislator in her final term, said before the vote Monday. “I’m heartbroken. I’m also determined.”

“The core root of the issue”

Republicans uniformly opposed the bill in the House and the Senate. On Monday, House Republicans questioned the measure’s constitutionality and its usefulness, and they said the law wouldn’t be followed by the people most likely to commit violent crimes.

“Deal with violence,” said Rep. Anthony Hartsook, a Parker Republican. “… The tool that is used is an extension of that violence. Until you address the crimes and the people and the mental health that’s dealing with (violence), you’re not going to get to the core root of the issue.”

SB-3 is the product of months — and, in some ways, years — of debate, negotiation and broader political shifts, all against a backdrop of seemingly ceaseless mass shootings. After two years of failed attempts to pass assault weapons bans, lawmakers introduced the measure in early January with a different approach: banning the sale of many guns that accept detachable magazines.

It’s sponsored by Sen. Tom Sullivan, a Centennial Democrat whose son, Alex, died in the Aurora theater shooting. Sullivan had at more explicit assault weapons bans, but he provided pivotal support for SB-3. He cast it as a way to ratchet up enforcement of the state’s high-capacity magazine ban — which lawmakers passed after the theater shooting.

When the bill was introduced, it had enough House and Senate co-sponsors to clear both chambers. But Polis sought a loophole, a desire enabled by a group of holdout Senate Democrats and the absence of a would-be supporter, then-Sen. Sonya Jaquez Lewis, for the vote.

After acceding to the training and background check changes, Sullivan and co-sponsor Sen. Julie Gonzales shepherded the bill out of the Senate. It was then heavily amended in the House, largely to cut costs in a tight budget year.

Once the Senate’s sponsors accept the House’s changes, the bill goes to Polis. Earlier this month, Polis said he was “confident the improvements made to the bill will … protect our Second Amendment rights here in Colorado and improve the education and gun-safety knowledge of gun owners.”

Significant new gun regulation

Should Polis sign it, SB-3 would be a cornerstone of Colorado’s growing foundation of gun control legislation, and its passage shows just how far the state has moved in the last decade.

In 2013, Democratic lawmakers passed a package of gun-control bills, including the magazine ban. That prompted a successful campaign to recall two Democratic legislators, which then chilled additional gun legislation.

That attitude has changed as voters have increasingly sent Democrats to the statehouse. Those Democrats have grown more comfortable pursuing firearm regulation in a state plagued by mass shootings.

In the past several years, the state has adopted age limits, waiting periods, storage requirements, state permitting for gun sales, and a red-flag law allowing for the temporary removal of a person’s firearms.

Still, SB-3 prompted extensive and heated debate in both chambers, including for several hours before the final vote Monday.

The state’s history of mass shootings was also omnipresent: In response to Republican criticism that the bill would limit “law-abiding citizens” from purchasing firearms, Denver Democratic Rep. Jennifer Bacon read the names of people killed in schools and grocery stores.

Each of them, she said, was a law-abiding citizen who “died of the crime of mass shooting.”

“I want us to recognize,” she said, “that we can prevent the crime of mass murder by gun.”

The Jefferson County Coroner’s Office, in a newly completed autopsy report, ruled last month’s death of Anne Marie Hochhalter, a 43-year-old paralyzed in the 1999 shooting, was a homicide.

Hochhalter died of sepsis, with complications from paraplegia due to two gunshot wounds serving as a “significant contributing factor,”  Dr. Dawn B. Holmes, a forensic pathologist in the coroner’s office, wrote in the 13-page report.

Holmes’ ruling that “the manner of death is best classified as homicide,” means the death toll from the April 20, 1999, school shooting has increased to 13 students and one teacher. The two killers took their own lives.

Hochhalter, who died in her Westminster home on Feb. 16, was paralyzed after being shot in the back. She spent the rest of her life in a wheelchair with ongoing health issues. However, loved ones told The Denver Post after her death that despite her medical complications and grief, she never wanted to be portrayed as a victim.

Hochhalter lived a rich life surrounded by friends, loved ones and dogs. She advocated for the disability community and had an affinity for playing musical instruments.

“She was fiercely independent,” Sue Townsend, stepmother of 18-year-old Lauren Townsend, who died in the Columbine shooting, told The Post last month “She was a fighter. She’d get knocked down — she struggled a lot with health issues that stemmed from the shooting — but I’d watch her pull herself back up. She was her best advocate and an advocate for others who weren’t as strong in the disability community.”

The others killed at Columbine that day include Cassie Bernall, 17; Steve Curnow, 14; Corey DePooter, 17; Kelly Fleming, 16; Matt Kechter, 16; Daniel Mauser, 15; Daniel Rohrbough, 15; William “Dave” Sanders, 47; Rachel Scott, 17; Isaiah Shoels, 18; John Tomlin, 16; and Kyle Velasquez, 16.

Anne Marie Hochhalter, a 17-year-old senior at Columbine when she was shot in the spine by two deranged classmates, died this week at 43 possibly from complications with the injuriesshe sustained that tragic day. She outlived 12 of her schoolmates and a teacher who died April 20, 1999. Austin Eubanks, who was shot twice, died at 37 following a long battle with an opioid addiction that was a result of the shooting. Both are survived by Richard Castaldo, Patrick Ireland and Sean Graves who also were severely wounded and have continued to honor the legacy of those who died at Columbine.

After Columbine, there was a mass movement for change. Hope was palpable that this would never happen again. Police reviewed mistakes they made in delaying their entry into the building. Laws were changed so that the shooters would not have been able to get their guns in Colorado legally. A hotline was established for students, parents and teachers to report threats, which has prevented some plotted attacks. And Coloradans united around the survivors and their families.

Columbine High School shooting survivor dies decades after tragedy. Her tenacious spirit is remembered.

But then the mass shootings continued – at schools, at concerts, at offices, and at parades. The pace began to pick up sometime in the last decade. Some shootings were orchestrated by foreign entities as terrorist attacks, but most were home-grown Americans slaughtering their friends, neighbors, and sometimes complete strangers with a bloodthirst that is unimaginable to anyone who hasn’t seen armed combat in war.

Also, this week, street signs on C-470 were finally updated to reflect the change of Lucent Boulevard to honor Kendrick Castillo. Kendrick was killed during the 2019 Highlands Ranch school shooting. He threw himself on one of the gunmen, saving the lives of his classmates, but suffering a fatal wound in the process. Now Kendrick Castillo Way reminds us all of a teenager who shouldn't have had to be a hero in his high school classroom but sacrificed himself to save others.

His parents visited his grave .

Sadly, these tragedies have divided the nation, and little hope remains that there will be an end to the violence.

Some survivors have dedicated their lives to preventing more ripples from forming, only to be accused of being un-American because of the politics and rights that envelop guns. In Colorado, Sen. Tom Sullivan’s son was killed in the Aurora Theater shooting. He sponsored a bill that passed the Colorado Senate that will make it harder for people to buy semi-automatic weapons with detachable magazines, like the one used to kill Sullivan’s son, Alex Sullivan, and 11 others at a midnight screening of Dark Knight Rises in 2012.

Perhaps instead of derision, Sullivan should be met with compassion as he seeks to protect others from gun violence.

Families who have lost their children at school shootings now support one another through an informal network, but part of the toll taken by these mass shootings has been the suicides that follow -- Anne Marie Hochhalter’s mother shot herself just as the family was moving into a new house that would be accessible for Anne Marie, Jeremy Richman killed himself after his son was killed at Newtown Elementary School, and two teen survivors of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting killed themselves in 2019.

The trauma and loss was insurmountable for some.

But somehow Anne Marie Hochhalter endured. She thrived and lived her life well. She loved her animals, her friends and the ocean, which she only got to visit once.

“She was fiercely independent,” Sue Townsend told The Denver Post. “She was a fighter. She’d get knocked down -- she struggled a lot with health issues that stemmed from the shooting — but I’d watch her pull herself back up. She was her best advocate and an advocate for others who weren’t as strong in the disability community.”

Townsend's stepdaughter Lauren Townsend was killed at Columbine and said she "acquired" Anne Marie as a daughter in the aftermath of the shooting and Anne Marie's mother's suicide.

Perhaps there is still hope that Americans can unite and stop new ripples of trauma and loss from consuming so much that is good in this world.

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Hochhalter was 17 when her life shifted from teen clarinet player to among the most injured survivors of the 1999 Columbine High School shooting. The high school junior was paralyzed after being shot in the back. She spent the rest of her days in a wheelchair with medical complications.

Six months after the shooting, her mother, Carla Hochhalter, walked into an Englewood pawnshop, asked to see a revolver and

Amid the media frenzy, medical care and grief, Anne Marie Hochhalter was determined to live life on her own terms. She went on to find her new normal, living independently in a handicap-accessible home with dogs to love and friends to cherish.

Anne Marie Hochhalter, 43, was found dead in her Westminster home Sunday.

Her death appears to be complications from the medical issues she suffered from the shooting, said Sue Townsend, stepmother of Lauren Townsend who died in the Columbine shooting. Sue and Rick Townsend reached out to Anne Marie Hochhalter after the tragedy and formed a familial relationship with her, calling her their “acquired daughter.”

“She was fiercely independent,” Sue Townsend said. “She was a fighter. She’d get knocked down — she struggled a lot with health issues that stemmed from the shooting — but I’d watch her pull herself back up. She was her best advocate and an advocate for others who weren’t as strong in the disability community.”

Editorial: The legacy of Columbine survivor Anne Marie Hochhalter — hope for an America divided over gun violence

The families, united by tragedy, found joy within each other's understanding, caring nature. They spent holidays and vacations together and developed a unique, intimate bond knitted together by wounds few else could understand.

"She was fun," Sue Townsend said.

In 2018, they all took a Hawaii trip and rigged an innertube so Anne Marie Hochhalter could float in the ocean, her legs dangling in the water.

"She said the two hours she was out there she didn’t have any nerve pain at all," Sue Townsend said. "The ocean was her happy place even though she didn’t get to go there but once."

Nathan Hochhalter, Anne Marie Hochhalter's brother, said his big sister was always a straight 'A' student who loved learning and reading. She had an affinity for musical instruments, playing harp, piano, clarinet and guitar.

"And she loved her mom a lot," Nathan Hochhalter said.

Animals -- particularly furry, four-legged friends -- filled a huge part of Anne Marie Hochhalter's heart.

She fostered dogs and owned several over the years, doting on them.

"She could probably name every dog in the neighborhood but maybe not the neighbors," Sue Townsend said, laughing.

Two neighbors, Jan and Dave Anderson, who were a part of Anne Marie Hochhalter's village, are taking her beloved chiweenie dog, Georgie.

Though Anne Marie Hochhalter was often in pain, she found escape in cinema. Sometimes, she and her friends would call each other, turn on a movie at the same time and watch it silently together over the phone, Sue Townsend said.

More than anything, Sue Townsend said Anne Marie Hochhalter would have wanted people to know she wasn't a victim.

Her resilience, Sue Townsend said, was driven in part by stubbornness.

"It was this attitude of 'I’ll show you,'" she said. "'You’re not going to get me down.'"

In 2016, Anne Marie Hochhalter wrote a letter to the mother of Dylan Klebold who, along with Eric Harris, killed twelve students and one teacher in a shooting rampage at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999.

The letter to Sue Klebold coincided with an ABC television interview promoting her book "A Mother's Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of Tragedy."

In the letter, Anne Marie Hochhalter told Sue Klebold she harbored no ill will toward her.

"Just as I wouldn't want to be judged by the sins of my family members, I hold you in that same regard," Hochhalter wrote. "It's been a rough road for me, with many medical issues because of my spinal cord injury and intense nerve pain, but I choose not to be bitter towards you. A good friend once told me, 'Bitterness is like swallowing a poison pill and expecting the other person to die.' It only harms yourself. I have forgiven you and only wish you the best."

The gathering, set up by gun safety and other organizations, is the main public event marking the anniversary, which is more subdued than in previous milestone years. It’s scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Friday at First Baptist Church 1373 Grant St, in Denver, after being moved from the state Capitol.

Former Arizona Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, who began campaigning for gun safety after she was nearly killed in a mass shooting, will be among those speaking at the vigil. So will Nathan Hochhalter, whose sister Anne Marie was paralyzed after she was shot at Columbine. Several months after the shooting, their mother, Carla Hochhalter, took her own life.

The organizers of the vigil, which will also honor all those impacted by the shooting, include Colorado Ceasefire, Brady United Against Gun Violence and Colorado Faith Communities United Against Gun Violence, but they say it will not be a political event.

Tom Mauser, whose son Daniel, a sophomore who excelled in math and science, was killed at Columbine, decided to set up the vigil after learning school officials did not plan to organize a large community event as they did on the 20th anniversary. Mauser, who became a gun safety advocate after the shooting, said he realizes that it takes a lot of volunteers and money to put together that kind of event but he wanted to give people a chance to gather and mark the passage of 25 years since the shooting, a significant number people can relate to.

“For those who do want to reflect on it, it is something for them,” said Mauser, who is on Colorado Ceasefire’s board and asked the group to help organize the event at a church near the state Capitol in Denver. It had been scheduled to be held on the steps of the Capitol but was moved indoors because of expected rain.

Mauser successfully led the campaign to pass a ballot measure requiring background checks for all firearm buyers at gun shows in 2000 after Colorado’s legislature failed to change the law. It was designed to close a loophole that helped a friend of the Columbine gunmen obtain three of the four firearms used in the attack.

A proposal requiring such checks nationally, inspired by Columbine, failed in Congress in 1999 after passing the Senate but dying in the House, said Robert Spitzer, professor emeritus at the State University of New York-Cortland and author of several books on gun politics.

Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore ran on a gun safety agenda against Republican George W. Bush the following year, but after his stance was mistakenly seen as a major reason for his defeat, Democrats largely abandoned the issue for the following decade, Spitzer said. But gun safety became a more prominent political issue again after the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting, he said.

Without much action nationally on guns, Democrat-led and Republican-controlled states have taken to responding to mass shootings.

Those killed at Columbine included Dave Sanders, a teacher who was shot as he shepherded students to safety during the attack. He lay bleeding in a classroom for almost four hours before authorities reached him. The students killed included one who wanted to be a music executive like his father, a senior and captain of the girls’ varsity volleyball team, and a teen who enjoyed driving off-road in his beat-up Chevy pickup.

Sam Cole, another Colorado Ceasefire board member, said he hopes people will come out to remember the victims and not let the memory of them fade. The students killed would now be adults in the prime of their lives with families of their own, he said.

“It����ap just sad to think that they are always going to be etched in our mind as teenagers,” he said.

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Two heavily armed shooters had entered the Jefferson County school late in the morning on April 20, 1999, and proceeded to kill 12 of their classmates and a teacher, injuring dozens more in a tragedy that shocked Colorado and the nation.

The shooting, which ended with the two killers taking their own lives, reshaped school security across the United States and served as a precursor to the litany of mass killings that have taken place across the country in the decades since — so much so that the school’s very name, Columbine, remains synonymous with school shootings.

But what happened next, after DiManna fled the building with her colleagues and pupils, is also part of Columbine’s legacy, the one that, 25 years later, both current and former employees talk about the most: the resiliency and hope that persists in a community marked by one of the deadliest school shootings in American history.

“We take care of each other,”  DiManna, who still teaches math at the high school, said in a recent interview. “You don’t really leave your family after trauma — and that is what Columbine is.”

And that’s why the 53-year-old, who will retire at the end of this academic year, has spent her entire career at Columbine despite such tragedy. DiManna is one of 15 current Columbine staff members who were either employees or students at the time of the shooting.

As Jeffco Public Schools marked the shooting’s 25th anniversary, officials held a media day with Columbine and district staff earlier this month to talk about the changes to school security that occurred nationwide in the wake of the shooting, such as lockdown drills and the, Colorado statewide anonymous reporting system for students.

Much has changed in 25 years. Those who were students at the time of the shooting have become parents and the pupils that now sit in the high school’s classrooms are too young to remember the tragedy, having not been born until years later.

One thing that hasn’t changed, though, is that at 11:20 a.m. each April 20 — around the time the shooting began — former Principal Frank DeAngelis gathers at the school with families and staff to read the names of the 12 students and one teacher who died that day: Cassie Bernall, Steven Robert Curnow, Corey DePooter, Kelly Fleming, Matt Kechter, Daniel Mauser, Danny Rohrbough, Dave Sanders, Rachel Scott, Isaiah Shoels, John Tomlin, Lauren Townsend and Kyle Velasquez.

“Columbine represents a time to remember,” said DeAngelis, who served as principal for almost two decades, and made it his mission to rebuild the school after the shooting and to help his students through the trauma.

DeAngelis retired in 2014, two years after he fulfilled a promise he made after the attack to remain as principal until all of the students in Columbine feeder schools at the time of the shooting had graduated.

“Columbine also represents hope,” he said. “Columbine is strong.”

The day has also become where students and staff give back to the community through volunteer projects.

“The community came together and made it stronger,” said current Principal Scott Christy, adding, “I hope Columbine is a place of hope for those who have experienced tragedy.”

On the day of the shooting, DiManna was a 28-year-old in her fifth year of teaching at Columbine, a school she also graduated from in 1989.

For DiManna, the moments after she heard screaming followed like this: A teacher pulled a fire alarm to evacuate the building. Her sister, Kim, who was a senior, found her and DiManna told her to leave — but she did not do so herself until after helping evacuate the math department����ap classrooms.

DiManna found her sister again outside, where they saw an injured student near a stoplight before going into a house across the street, which is where she called her husband.

Residents opening their doors to students and staff fleeing the shooting isn’t the only thing DiManna remembers. She also recalls youth ministries helping care for students in the days that followed no matter whether they were members of their churches or not.

“I don’t know how many communities could take care of kids as ours did,” she said.

At the time, the shooting at Columbine was the deadliest at a K-12 school in U.S. history. There hadn’t yet been in Newtown, Connecticut, Parkland, Florida, or Uvalde, Texas.

In other words, there weren’t many people who knew what the survivors of the school shooting experienced and how it would affect them in the years that followed. They couldn’t understand how, for Columbine survivors, routine fire drills can be a trigger, how lockdown drills can create a panic, or how each year when April rolls around, so, too, comes anxiety about what might happen, DiManna said.

That’s also why DiManna stayed at Columbine. The support that the community provides didn’t end 25 years ago, she said.

Christy, the school’s principal, checks on the staff members who were at Columbine in 1999 each time there’s another school shooting or something else happens that could upset them, DiManna said.

“We just pick each other up,” she said. “You always knew if you were having one of those days, or something happened, you had someone to talk to.”

The reason DiManna returned to Columbine after the shooting is also simple.

“I wanted to teach,” she said.

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The measure, cleared its initial hurdle in the House Judiciary Committee and now heads directly to the House floor, after a late amendment removed financial penalties, which would’ve routed the bill to another committee, and replaced them with a petty offense charge. The measure still needs two floor votes to pass the House before restarting the process in the Senate.

The measure’s definition of “assault weapons” includes semi-automatic rifles and pistols with fixed large-capacity magazines or that have the ability to accept detachable magazines, along with other types of high-powered firearms and various capabilities. The bill does not ban the possession of the weapons.

“We know about the ever-present threat of mass shootings, public shootings, with few to zero injured survivors, but fatalities in the double digits … we know that those continue unchecked but for courageous, data-driven policy change,” said Rep. Elisabeth Epps, who’s sponsoring the bill with Rep. Tim Hernández. Both are Denver Democrats.

The bill passed the committee on a 7-3 party-line vote. A similar bill, which was also sponsored by Epps, died in House Judiciary last year.

Two of the Democrats who voted no 11 months ago are no longer on the committee, and their replacements both voted in support. Rep. Marc Snyder, a Colorado Springs Democrat who also voted no last year, was excused Tuesday night.

Updated at 5:40 p.m.: Opponents of the weapons bill have formed a bulk of public commenters as the hearing has worn on. The committee room is still full, more than six hours after the hearing began and with several more hours still to go.

It’s possible the committee won’t vote until after midnight.

Though the vast majority of testimony from both supporters and opponents has passed without incident, one woman was ejected from the room after she cursed at Hernández.

Critics of the bill argued that the bill infringes upon their rights of self-defense and that it would decimate the gun industry in Colorado.

Rod Brandenburg, who owns Grandpa’s Pawn and Gun in Longmont, told lawmakers that he’s “been in business over 75 years, we have sold over 100,000 guns that have never been involved in a mass shooting, and you want to penalize us.”

Supporters of the bill are still present, recognizable by the red shirts they wear to show support for gun reform. Grant Cramer, a sophomore at East High School in Denver, described the shootings that rocked his school last year. Two administrators were shot by a student who later died by suicide a year ago, and another student was fatally shot outside the school weeks before that.

The shootings sparked community outcries and prompted students to repeatedly march to the Capitol and demand responses from legislators.

“How many more school shootings do I have to endure before we can come together as a state and say that citizens don’t need AR-15s to hunt and for self-defense?” Cramer said.

Updated at 1:17 p.m.: As the first public commenters began to testify for and against the “assault” weapons bill late Tuesday morning, common themes quickly emerged.

For supporters of the bill, which would ban the sale and purchase of certain semi-automatic weapons, the measure is a response to the mass shootings that have become routine in Colorado and in America. High-casualty mass shootings — including several in Colorado — have been carried out using the sort of weapons that would be curtailed by the bill.

“I have grown up as part of ‘Generation Lockdown,’ a generation that has only ever known the consequences and ensuing fear of gun violence in schools,” Rhiannon Danborn, a senior at Arvada West High School, told lawmakers. She described first hearing about mass shootings when she was 6 years old, after the Newtown, Connecticut, shooting, in which 20 first-graders and six adults were shot to death.

Opponents, meanwhile, countered that the bill was so broad that it would cover a number of handguns and other firearms. They accused lawmakers of infringing on residents’ ability to own firearms and defend themselves, and representatives of pro-gun rights groups pledged to sue the state should the ban ever become law.

Several compared firearms to trucks, given the potential danger from both.

“You cannot legislate away evil, period,” said Amanda Hardin, a firearms instructor. “But you can defend yourself against evil. I want to be clear, this is not an assault weapons ban bill. The language in this bill makes this a gun ban.”

Several other opponents argued that the issue in America wasn’t high-powered firearms or gun-ownership, but untreated mental illness. That’s a frequent talking point from gun-rights advocates. Democratic legislators repeatedly pressed them to explain why America has so many more mass shootings than comparable nations with stronger gun restrictions.

Rep. Judy Amabile, a Boulder Democrat, asked one opponent if he thought Americans are just more “monstrous” than their peers overseas.

“There was a study released last year — as every other G7 country combined,” Rep. Javier Mabrey, a Denver Democrat, told one panel of gun-rights advocates. The Group of 7 countries are the U.S., Canada, Japan, Germany, Italy, France and the United Kingdom. “My question, for anybody, is why? Why is that?”

Original story: Colorado legislators kicked off a marathon committee hearing Tuesday about whether to ban the sale and transfer of a range of semi-automatic firearms here, a bill that’s likely to pass its first vote and has drawn hundreds of supporters and opponents who’ve signed up to testify.

The bill, , would prohibit the sale, purchase, transfer, import and manufacture of so-called “assault weapons” in Colorado.

The bill is sponsored by Denver Democratic Reps. Hernández and Epps. Last year, a similar bill died in the House Judiciary Committee on the anniversary of the Columbine High School shooting.

The same committee will vote on the measure Tuesday — though, given that more than 500 people have signed up to testify, the vote may not come until early Wednesday morning.

But two of last year’s no votes are off of the committee, replaced by progressive legislators who are co-sponsoring the bill. That gives the bill a strong chance of advancing out of committee.

Epps and Hernández are expected to make slight changes to the bill related to the transfer and transportation of the weapons. If passed Tuesday, the measure would next go to the House Finance Committee before moving to the House floor.

Hernández, a 27-year-old teacher and freshman lawmaker, began his opening comments to the House Judiciary Committee by describing his life running parallel to the steady drumbeat of mass shootings in the United States, from Columbine in 1999 to Aurora and Sandy Hook in 2012 and the STEM School Highlands Ranch shooting in 2019.

“I’ve been living with this my entire life, from 2009 to 2022,” Hernández said. “Nine out of 10 of the mass shooting incidents with the most casualties involve the use of at least one assault weapon. This has been happening my entire life. And, to be frank with you, I’m not waiting anymore.”

Dozens of pro-gun activists protested outside of the Capitol on Tuesday morning. The committee room in the Capitol was at capacity, with an overflow room set up elsewhere in the building. An audio livestream of the committee is

Republicans are uniformly opposed to the bill, and pro-gun reform groups have pledged to file a lawsuit to contest the measure should it become law.

Opening questions from the committee included Republicans questioning the weapons’ prevalence in gun violence and Democrats countering by listing the mass shootings perpetrated by them because of their unique lethality.

The bill is one of several gun reform measures backed by legislative Democrats this year. Another measure, to limit where guns can be carried in Colorado, is set to be heard in committee Wednesday.

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A bill to ban the purchase and transfer of so-called assault weapons () is set for the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday. Legislators said that hundreds of people have signed up to testify for and against the bill, and the committee is scheduled to start as soon as the House adjourns Tuesday morning (which will likely be by 9:30 or 10 a.m.).

Last year’s hearing for a similar bill lasted more than 12 hours, and the vote to defeat that measure happened well past midnight — which, coincidentally, meant that the bill died on the anniversary of the 1999 Columbine High School shooting.

If the length of this year’s hearing likely will mirror last year’s, the outcome will likely be different. Two of the three Democrats who sank the bill last year are off the committee, replaced by two progressive lawmakers who are co-sponsoring the bill. It’s widely expected to clear the committee, which will send it toward the full House floor.

There, it will be met with hours of debate and resistance from Republicans — though Democrats’ sizable majority means the bill is likely to clear the chamber.

Last week’s snowstorm forced legislators to cancel hearings for other gun bills. Those have yet to be rescheduled. This week will see another lengthy firearm-related hearing, though: A bill to limit where guns can be carried () will be heard in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday at 1:30 p.m.

Here’s what else is happening this week in the Capitol:

Single-stair development and the return of two housing bills

On Tuesday, the House Transportation, Housing and Local Government committee will hear , which would allow for taller single-stair buildings to be built in Colorado. It’s a somewhat niche policy objective that’s common in Europe and beloved by land-use reformers and some housing advocates in America. The bill would allow for more development on small lots, but it’s also drawn some safety concerns from fire chiefs.

That committee will also hear , which seeks to better regulate how the state operates housing programs and works to bolster housing.

, which would give local governments the first crack at buying for-sale affordable housing, is scheduled for a vote before the full House this week, and the various construction are all set for consideration across the House and Senate this week.

A “for-cause eviction” bill (), which would require that landlords have cause before evicting a tenant, is also scheduled for a first floor vote this week in the Senate, where it died on the calendar last year. The bill is a progressive and House priority this time around.

Other notable bills

The House is scheduled to hold final votes on two of Rep. David Ortiz’s disability rights bills, concerning motor vehicle access and accessible rental units, on Monday. A measure to ban the use of the term “excited delirium” in training or in law enforcement reports () cleared a final vote in the Senate on Monday, too. The vote was party-line, 23-12.

, which would ban the sale of a high-potency chemical often used in suicides, is set for its first committee hearing in the Senate’s Business, Labor and Technology Committee on Tuesday.

Two Democrat-backed air quality bills ( and ) will both have their first hearings in the Senate Transportation and Energy Committee on Wednesday.

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Elected sheriff in 1998, Stone served one term, which was defined by Columbine, including the sheriff’s office’s initial response to the high school scene, where responders waited to enter the building, as well as controversies involving the aftermath of the April 20, 1999, mass shooting in which two student gunmen killed 12 students, a teacher, and then themselves. Twenty-four people were physically injured in the shooting and countless people, near and far, were psychologically scarred.

In 2002, when Stone decided not to run for re-election, he told The Denver Post:  “This was my dream job and it has turned into a nightmare.”

Current Sheriff Jeff Shrader, , recalled his former boss as a kind man who was committed to his family.

“John’s daughter called me this morning with the sad news. I worked with and for John when he was a county commissioner and then when he served one term as sheriff,” Shrader said. “In all the years I knew him, he was a kind and caring man who loved his family deeply. My sincerest condolences to his family and friends.”

After the Columbine shooting, a recall effort by locals, including some families of victims, was initiated against Stone. Area residents spearheaded a recall effort, saying the sheriff’s office, under Stone’s leadership, mismanaged its response to Columbine and the subsequent investigation. The Browns crossed swords with Stone, in part, because the sheriff once named their son as a suspect in the case. It was an unfounded accusation.

“I have no enmity, no  anger toward him, he was simply not qualified for that situation and that great a tragedy,” said Randy Brown. “I really believe he didn’t know what was going on with all the cover-ups of Columbine. There were so many, and there were other players involved who were more important than him. I’m really sad, what a shame. This makes me very sad.”

Born in Battle Creek, Mich., on July 7, 1949, Stone earned a criminal justice degree from San Jose State University in 1971. He later earned a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Colorado Denver.

On May 28, 1971, Stone was drafted into the U.S. Army, and after his release from active duty, he served with the California National Guard until October 1976.

Stone came to Colorado in 1974 and he served as a police officer in Lakewood for 13 years. Stone was elected a Jefferson County Commissioner in 1987 and he served District 3 for three consecutive four-year terms. He also served as president of the Bancroft Fire Protection District from 1982 until 1987.

As a commissioner, Stone was a “strong supporter of transportation improvements, particularly new roads, bridges and interchanges in the fast-growing south part of the county,” according to a county biography. He also supported county libraries and open space.

Gary Laura, a former Jefferson County commissioner, recalled a March 1996 trip with Stone to London where the two were watching a boxing match on television and the program was interrupted by breaking news — a shooting massacre in Dunblane, Scotland.

The news report described in detail that a “local man” walked into the elementary school, firing multiple shots from four pistols, killing 16 students, a teacher and injuring 15 others. The killer then shot himself.

“John was totally devastated by this horrible incident,” Laura said. “Of course at that time, John didn’t even know, nor was he thinking, that he would be Jeffco sheriff someday.”

Laura recalled Stone, his colleague and friend, as a prankster who was also known for his unbridled pursuit of frequent flyer miles.

One of Stone’s pranks involved Laura’s work desk. When Stone knew that Laura would be out of the office for awhile, Stone gradually, over time, lowered the desk by turning the height adjustment on each desk leg.

“After a few weeks, I noticed something was wrong with my desk,” Laura said. “It got so bad that I couldn’t pull my chair up to it without hitting my knees on the center drawer.”

Stone smirked with amusement until he finally told Laura what he had done. They readjusted the desk legs together.

In 2003, Stone worked in private security, founding JP Stone & Associates. In 2006, he was hired by Northwest Airlines as a district security coordinator based at Denver International Airport. Northwest transferred Stone to the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport where he was regional security manager. He retired from Delta Airlines.

In April 2006, Stone met Susan Gates, at that time a Northwest Airlines flight attendant, while she was training at DIA. On Dec. 8, 2010, they were married in South Tahoe, Nevada.

“John and I really hit it off when we went on a date to the Minnesota Zoo,” Gates-Stone said in an interview prior to Stone’s death.  “We never separated after that day when we fell in love. We spent years traveling all over the world.”

She described their relationship as “soulmates” who met late in life.

Stone is survived by his wife; a daughter, Lori Babcock; brothers Jerry and Steven; a sister, Pat Ulicki; two stepsons and a stepdaughter; and two grandsons. He was preceded in death by a son, Brian; and his parents, Elvon and Norma Stone.

Plans for a memorial service are pending.

Steve Garnaas was a staff writer with The Denver Post from December 1984 until January 1998.

John and Maria Castillo say they are hoping to use the act to uncover more information about possible warnings school officials received before the shooting almost three years ago and their response, alleging in the lawsuit that officials “breached their duty” to protect students and employees from an act that was “reasonably foreseeable.”

“We knew that there was a credible threat one week before the shooting,” John Castillo said. “It����ap information like that, that normally wouldn’t be brought out and exposed if it wasn’t through the ability to go through depositions and pursue the truth (via the Claire Davis Act).”

Historically, it has been “basically impossible” to hold a school legally responsible for a shooting despite any kind of warning in advance of a possible attack because it would have to be proved that officials showed willful and wanton conduct. The Colorado Governmental Immunity Act also prohibits most lawsuits against public agencies for liability, according to education attorneys and mass shooting experts.

But the Claire Davis School Safety Act – which was passed following a fatal shooting at Arapahoe High School in 2013 — opened the door to such lawsuits in Colorado by allowing parents to sue if a school fails to provide “reasonable care” to protect all students and employees from the violence that is considered “reasonably foreseeable.”

Yet, few — if any — lawsuits have been filed under the act since it passed seven years ago — until the Castillos filed their suit last year.

None of the attorneys or experts who spoke to The Post were aware of another case besides the suit filed by the Castillo family. The state’s civil court records system doesn’t allow for keyword searches so a Denver Post reporter was also unable to find other lawsuits.

There have likely been few cases to make it as far as the Castillos lawsuit against STEM because while the law is clear that schools can be held liable when there is violence, such as murder, first-degree assault, or a sexual assault, it is murkier whether that is also the case in more common situations when another student injures a peer, resulting in say a broken bone, said Igor Raykin, an attorney not associated with the lawsuit, who specializes in education law.

Coloradans have faced more school shootings than most, but they are still rare.

Supporters of the law said it is a way for families to get information about school shootings without having to “beg for information.” School safety experts said such information can be used to improve how schools respond before a shooting ever occurs. But there are critics, too.

“The Claire Davis Act is an extraordinarily, sloppy, poorly written piece of legislation,” Raykin said, adding, “It is not entirely clear when there would actually be a liability in these kinds of cases and even what constitutes a crime of violence.”

When legislators passed the Claire Davis School Safety Act, schools opposed the law because they believed it would increase their insurance liability and wouldn’t prevent violence. Some lawmakers were also concerned about potential unintended consequences of the act, fearing it could stop schools from helping students with mental illnesses and that schools could expel more students in an effort to avoid liability.

These fears have come to fruition with schools suspending or expelling students who they believe pose any potential threat, even minor ones, Raykin said.

“Schools are using the Claire Davis Act as a weapon right now,” he said.

But the Castillos and their attorney, Dan Caplis, said the law is allowing them to glean information about the shooting at STEM — which marked its third anniversary on Saturday — that would otherwise be kept secret.

“Over time, the Claire Davis Act is going to do more to protect students and teachers than any law ever passed by the legislature,” Caplis said.  “The Claire Davis Act…gives survivors the power to investigate and to find the truth about whether a school failed to do what it should have done to protect the kids.”

“We want the truth”

Most school shootings feature some kind of warning in advance, including prior threats and communications that a shooter plans to carry out an attack. And in many cases, someone — students, school staff, family members — observed a sign but did not act on it, according to

It’s the impetus behind which allows students and others to report concerns they have about their peers and has become a critical part of the state’s efforts to prevent another school shooting after the Columbine High School massacre more than two decades ago.

“(Gunmen) always talk about what they are going to do because they are consumed with this idea, this plan they have,” said Jaclyn Schildkraut, an associate professor of criminal justice at the State University of New York at Oswego, who studies mass shootings.

The Claire Davis School Safety Act was passed in 2015, two years after 17-year-old Claire Davis was killed by another student at Arapahoe High School.

After the shooting, Davis’ parents helped draft the law amid their own fight for information about the shooting. Their battle paved the way for a report on the shooting by the University of Colorado Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence and the University of Northern Colorado’s Department of Criminal Justice.

The report found that school administrators botched a threat assessment on the student who carried out the attack, as well as a culture of silence that strained the flow of information between school officials and law enforcement, and other failures to act on warning signs.

The Castillos allege in their lawsuit that STEM officials received multiple warnings about the risk of a possible shooting, such as when an unnamed person changed a mention of programs to prevent suicide and shootings on the schools Wikipedia page to include “Do they work? We shall see” in April 2019, according to the lawsuit.

The Castillos’ son, Kendrick, was killed after tackling one of the two shooters who entered STEM on May 7, 2019 and fired on their classmates. Eight other students were injured.

One of the gunmen has been sentenced to life without parole for killing Kendrick Castillo. The second shooter pleaded guilty, including to first-degree murder, and was sentenced to life in prison, plus 38 years with the possibility of parole.

Attorneys representing STEM and Douglas County School District declined to comment on pending litigation. A district spokeswoman also declined to comment.

The lawsuit alleges the school also failed to act on other warnings, including a call from an anonymous parent to Douglas County school officials where the parent told them she feared a “repeat of Columbine and Arapahoe (shootings).”  The school investigated the allegations but found no evidence to support them,

“We want the truth and we want to be able to talk about it,” John Castillo said. “We want to be able to find out what things need to take place to make positive change in our schools all across our nation, not just here in Colorado.”

School officials also knew of one of the shooter’s disciplinary history and mental health struggles, which included self-harming and suicidal thoughts, according to the lawsuit.

The overlap between suicidal thoughts and mass shootings is complex. The decision to carry out a violent act, such as a mass shooting, can imply suicidal intentions, but it����ap rarely the sole or primary factor, according to the Secret Service study.

Mental health experts have said that people with suicidal thoughts or mental illness are more likely to be the targets of violence than harm others and rhetoric that they are dangerous promotes stigma and can prevent people from seeking help.

Going to trial

Nationally, the results of lawsuits against schools and districts following a shooting have been mixed. A lawsuit filed by parents of two children killed in the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School was dismissed in 2018 after a judge said the district was protected by governmental immunity.

Last year, it was revealed the Broward County school district will pay the families of the 17 people killed and others injured or traumatized in the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., a total of $25 million,

Such lawsuits can bring closure to survivors, but they should also result in lessons that all school officials can use to improve their responses to potential warnings of violence and school safety, said Susan Payne, a school safety and prevention expert who founded the Safe2Tell tipline.

Last year, STEM and Douglas County schools said in court filings that they would deposit $387,000 – the most they said the Castillos can receive under the act – into the court registry without admitting liability and asked Douglas County District Judge Jeffery Holmes to dismiss the case as moot.

But Holmes denied their request to dismiss the case, writing in a Sept. 28 order that under the Claire Davis School Safety Act, the Castillos have “a special entitlement to discovery in cases involving incidents of school violence” and that dismissing the case “could hamper the ability to obtain appropriate discovery.”

The Castillos suit against STEM and the district is set to go to trial in September.

“The Claire Davis Act said it����ap not just about the governmental immunity lift or a finite amount of dollars, it����ap also about the discovery of what happened,” Payne said. “People do want to seek to understand what happened and it could be very painful to not know.”