Bullies and Black Trench Coats: The Columbine Shooting’s Most Dangerous Myths
On the 20th anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre, it’s time for a fact-check about the two killers
Published in
6 min readApr 19, 2019
By Gillian Brockell
The headlines in major newspapers the day after the Columbine massacre were shocking — and they were wrong:
- “Up to 25 Die in Colorado School Shooting”—The Washington Post
- “Gunmen Stalk School, Killing Up to 25 and Wounding 20”—Los Angeles Times)
- “High School Massacre: Columbine bloodbath leaves up to 25 dead”—The Denver Post
In fact, the death toll was lower — 12 students and one teacher were killed on April 20, 1999, by shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who then took their own lives. Even so, Columbine remained the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history until the attack at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018 that left 17 dead.
Saturday will mark 20 years since the Columbine massacre. And while correcting the death toll took only a day, other aspects of early reports that turned out to be unfounded have lingered in the nation’s subconscious.
