The Secret Sits

Columbine: Episode 3 - The Library

May 12, 2022 John W. Dodson Season 2 Episode 8
The Secret Sits
Columbine: Episode 3 - The Library
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Show Notes Transcript

Previously on The Secret Sits, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold have wreaked havoc inside of their school and everyone is in a panic, outside of the school everyone is in a state of shock and confusion and the President of the United States is on TV addressing the nation.  And that is where we find ourselves while we pick up our story today.

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[Underscore Music]

Previously on The Secret Sits, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold have wreaked havoc inside of their school and everyone is in a panic, outside of the school everyone is in a state of shock and confusion and the President of the United States is on TV addressing the nation.  And that is where we find ourselves while we pick up our story today.

[Theme Music Start]

Welcome to The Secret Sits, I’m your host John Dodson.  Join us every Thursday as we uncover the Secrets behind the world’s most fascinating true crime cases.  You can find all episodes of The Secret Sits for free on Apple Podcast, Spotify or where ever you get your podcasts.  And if you like what you are hearing, reach out to us on Instagram and Facebook @The Secret Sits Podcast or on Twitter @SecretSitsPod. Now, on with our story.

[Theme Music Play Out]

[Under Score Music]

 

11:29am, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold enter the library.  Inside of the library were 52 students, two teachers and two librarians. Just as the pair entered into the library, Eric fired two shots at a random desk.  Evan Todd had been hiding behind a pillar when the two entered the library, he attempted to take cover behind a copy machine, as he slid down behind the large copy machine, Eric’s bullets hit the desk and splinters shot across the room, hitting Evan in his eye and then his back.  He was not seriously injured and he quickly moved behind the administrative desk to gain more cover.

Within the library there were two rows of computers, the gunmen walked directly to these desks, Kyle Velasquez was sitting at one of the computer desks, unable to hide as well as some of the other students due to the fact that he was disabled.  Dylan Klebold walked up to Kyle and fired his shotgun, the spray hit the teen directly in his head, Kyle was now the third person whose life was taken today.  The two killers placed their duffel bags of mischief on the floor of the library and took time to reload their weapons.  After making sure that their weapons were ready to go again, the boys began walking between the computer rows, making their way toward the windows facing the giant outdoor staircase. 

The library was finally the place where Eric and Dylan felt they had the control of this situation like they had planned.  They ordered everyone to get up and out of their hiding spots.  But no one did.  The two were overcome with their excitement about what they were doing.  They shouted “Yahoo!” after shooting their guns, like they were currently participating in a high school pep rally, instead of murdering their classmates.  They told the perceived “Jocks” to stand and they told them, “Anybody with a white hat or a sports emblem on it is dead.”  White hats were typically worn around Columbine as a tradition for those on sports teams.  After the assailants announced this, several of the students attempted to hide away their hats and no one voluntarily stood up.

Noticing the growing police presence, the boys shot out the windows of the library which faced down on the senior parking lot, police returned fire, but no one was struck.  After pulling back from the window which now left them exposed to gunfire, Dylan removed his duster.  Dylan picked up his shotgun and aimed it at a random table and pulled the trigger.  He injured three students with this blast, Patrick Ireland, Daniel Steepleton and Makai Hall.

Eric, carrying his shotgun, walked down the isle next to the computer desks, he paused and knelt down on one knee and fired a shot from his shotgun under a desk, he hit 14-year-old Steven Curnow in the neck, killing the young teen.  Eric moved on to the next desk where he shot 17-year-old Kacey Ruegsegger, the bullet tore through the girl’s right shoulder and grazed her neck, in doing so it severed a major artery and Kacey gasped out loud at the excoriating pain, Eric looked down at the girl and said, “quit your bitching”.

Eric proceeded to a table positioned more south of the computer table, under this table were two students, Cassie Bernall and Emily Wyant.  When Eric arrived at this table, he slapped his hand down on top of the table as hard as he could twice, startling the girls hidden below.  Eric bent down, peered under the table and said “Peek-a-boo” and then he held up his shotgun in one hand and fired directly at Cassie’s head, the young blond girl with her infectious smile, slumped to the ground.

Because Eric had been holding his shotgun with only one hand, it bucked and recoiled, smacking him in the face and causing injury to his nose.  Instant Karma.  Eric told Dylan what had happened and that he had hurt himself and Dylan simply said, “Why’d you do that?”

After shooting Cassie, Eric turned to another table.  Bree Pasquale was sitting next to this desk, instead of under it like the other students were doing in their faint attempt to stay alive.  Eric approached Bree, the cut on his nose, bleeding quite a lot and the blood had begun to pool around the teen’s mouth, he looked down at the girl and asked her if she wanted to die.  The frightened girl looked back up at Eric and plead for her life, no she did not want to die.  Eric laughed maniacally and responded, “Everyone’s gonna die.”  But Eric did not shoot the girl, prompting Dylan to say “Shoot her”, indicating he wanted Eric to kill the girl, but Eric walked away and said, “No, we’re gonna blow up the school anyway.”

Dylan looked over and noticed that Patrick Ireland, while injured himself, was attempting to administer first aid to Makai Hall, who was also behind the table with him and had a bullet tear through his knee.  As Patrick was working on his friend, his head raised above the table line ever so slightly and Dylan fired at him, striking him twice in the head and once in the foot.  Patrick was nocked unconscious by the blasts, but he was not dead, Patrick was a survivor.  

Dylan Klebold then turned is attention away from this table and toward another.  Here he discovered 18-year-old Isaiah Shoels, 16-year-old Matthew Kechter and 16-year-old Craig Scott.  Craig was Rachel Scott’s younger brother and at this point the boy had no idea that his older sister had been the murderous couple’s first victim.  Dylan shouted to Eric that he had found a N word, which I will not repeat here, and he attempted to pull Isaiah Shoels out from under the table.  At this point Eric walked away from terrorizing Bree Pasquale and joined Dylan in terrorizing Isaiah, making more derogatory racial comments to the boy.  Both boys then fired their weapons under the table, Eric’s shot was true, hitting Isaiah Shoels directly in the chest, almost instantly killing the boy.  Dylan’s shot also hit its mark and hit and killed Matthew Kechter.  Craig Scott feigned death and laid under the table, in a pool of his friend’s blood, and it worked, when Eric and Dylan looked under the table at the dead bodies, they paid no mind to Craig as he laid there, petrified.

Eric then stood in the middle of the library and shouted, “Who’s ready to die next?”

Eric then threw one of his improvised explosive devices at the table which was still sheltering Patrick Ireland, Daniel Steepleton and Makai Hall.  The devise landed on Daniel’s thigh and when it did Makai quickly noticed it, grabbed it and tossed it behind the threesome, the devise exploded in mid-air, just seconds after Makai had thrown it.  Eric headed to the bookcases and jumped up, grabbing the book case, he began to shake it violently, an attempt to topple the bookshelves, which did not happen, but he did shoot a pile of books which had fallen out of the bookcase.

Dylan walked to the east area of the library and Eric came to join him.  Eric shot a glass display case next to the door to the library and then he turned and shot at the closest table to him, striking 17-year-old Mark Kintgen in his head and shoulder.  Eric then turned to his left and fired at another table, this shotgun blast hit three students, all 18-years-old; Lisa Kreutz, Lauren Townsend, and Valeen Schnurr.  Eric walked close to this table, it was the table closest to the great wall of windows, looking out into the large hallway just outside of the library.  Eric walked around the table and used his TEC-9 to shoot Lauren Townsend several more times, putting an end to the young girl’s life.

After these shots, which had just taken the life of Valeen Schnurr’s friend, Valeen, who was gravely injured, began screaming, “Oh my God, oh my God!”  Dylan took several quick paced steps toward the hysterical girl and he asked her if she believed that God existed.  Valeen responded that she did believe in God and Dylan said, “Why? God is gay” He then stood there and reloaded his weapon in front of the girl, but turned and walked away from her.

Eric Harris walked to another table, the shelter for two more girls, he bent down, looked at the girls, huddled under a table, believing that their lives may end at any moment and he just shook his head and said “pathetic”, he slowly walked away, to another table, Eric put his gun under the table and fired several rounds, hitting 16-year-old Nicole Nowlen and John Tomlin.  In response to this, John Tomlin scooted out from under the table, injured and afraid, just trying to escape the onslaught of terror, but when he cleared the safety of the table, Dylan Klebold began shooting him, repeatedly until he was dead.

Eric sauntered back to the table close to the windows, where he had murdered Lauren Townsend, she lay there unmoving and a 16-year-old girl called Kelly Fleming was sitting behind the table, like Bree Pasquale, she was forced to sit beside the table, due to lack of room under the table.  Eric lifted his shotgun and shot Kelly directly in her back, killing her instantly.  He then shot the table behind Kelly, this shot struck Lauren Townsend, who was already deceased, it struck Lisa Kreutz, her second gunshot wound and it also hit 18-year-old Jeanna Park.

The boys moved back to the center of the library and once again, they reloaded their weapons.  Eric then thrusts his weapon under a table, but the student who had been hiding there had moved to a different hiding spot.  He swung around and pointed his gun at another student, who he did not recognize and told the boy to identify himself.  This was John Savage; he actually knew Dylan Klebold and he did not understand what was happening.  John Savage turned to Dylan, looked him in the face and asked what they were doing.  Dylan just shrugged and simply answered, “Oh, just killing people.”  John Savage then asked the pair if they were going to kill him as well.  Dylan, possibly did not hear the question because of the blaring fire alarms, he responded “What?”  John Savage asked again, “are you going to kill me.”  Dylan said no and then told the boy to run, he did not need to be told twice, he jumped up and ran, escaping through the main entrance to the library.

Eric turned and fired a shot, striking 15-year-old Daniel Mauser in his ear and hand.  As an act of defiance, Daniel reacted by shoving a chair toward Eric Harris and attempting to possibly grab his legs, but Eric fired again and this time he hit Daniel in the center of his face, at close range, Daniel was the 12th person to die.

Eric and Dylan started moving south through the library, they were not concerned about who they shot or why they shot them, they would randomly fire their weapons underneath tables, not even knowing who was beneath them.  Under one table they critically injured two 17-year-olds, Jennifer Doyle and Austin Eubanks and 17-year-old Corey DePooter became the 13th victim of this massacre.

11:35 – 16 minutes into the fray.

10 people now lay dead in the library and a dozen more seriously injured.  The two assailants move back toward the front of the library and Eric thew a Molotov cocktail into one corner of the library, it failed to explode.  Evan Todd is still hidden behind the large reception desk at the entrance to the library and that is exactly where the two killers are headed.  Dylan pulled the chair out from under the desk and noticed Evan hiding, he also noticed that Evan was sporting a white baseball hat, Dylan asked him if he was a jock, to which Evan quickly responded no.  “Well, that’s good.  We don’t like jocks.” Dylan replied. Evan Todd had kept his head down, even during this interaction, so Dylan told Evan to show his face.  Evan moved the hat ever so slightly, reveling only part of his face.  Dylan asked him for one reason why he should not kill the boy and Evan said, “I don’t want trouble.”  This angered Dylan and he responded, “Trouble? You don’t even know what trouble is!”  Evan, panicked said, “That’s not what I meant!  I don’t have a problem with you guys.  I never will and I never did.” Dylan stood up and said he would let Evan live, but then told Eric that he could kill Evan if he wanted to.

Eric replied that he wanted to go back down to the commons, Dylan took one pot shot into the empty library staff breakroom and hit a small TV.  He then picked up a chair, next to the library counter and slammed the chair down on top of the computer terminal and library counter, just underneath the counter was Patti Nielson, one of the only teachers in the library.

Dylan and Eric walked out of the library at 11:36am.  After the shooters had left, the sequestered inhabitants of the library began cautiously leaving the room, 10 injured students along with 29 uninjured survivors left the library and escaped through the north emergency exit door. Kacey Ruegsegger, who had been one of the first people shot in the library, was bleeding profusely from her neck injury.  Craig Scott, helped her to evacuate from the library, when they had the chance.  Graig’s actions most likely saved Kacey’s life, had she been left in the library, she would have blead out before help would arrive.  Two students, Patrick Ireland and Lisa Kreutz, were too injured to move, so they remained in the building.  Teacher Patti Nielson crawled to the library staff breakroom, that Dylan had randomly shot into, and hid in a cupboard.

After leaving the library, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold walked to the science area of the school.  Here the two started a small fire in an empty storage closet.  The two then walked down the south hallway, as they walked away from the science area, a teacher popped out of their hiding area in the next room and extinguished the newly set fire.  The two boys now seemed aimless, they wondered around shooting into open and empty classrooms and they made their way back down to the cafeteria.

11:44am, Eric and Dylan are seen on the school security cameras as they make their way back into the commons.  Eric descended the staircase and stopped just on the last landing.  He crouched down into a shooters position and took aim at one of the propane bombs, which had failed to explode, he took his shot, but the tanks still refused to explode.  Dylan walked to the bomb to inspect it.  Eric took a random cup from a table, left behind as students had fled for their lives, and he drank whatever the cup contained.  Dylan put together a Molotov cocktail and threw it at the propane bomb, after a second or two the gallon of fuel attached to the bomb ignited, but the school’s fire suppression system quickly doused the flames.  The two boys left the commons at 11:46am.

At this point, the school felt very vacant, and the boys seemed to aimlessly walk the hallways, like they could not decide what to do next.  The teachers and students still secreted away in their hiding spots dared not move, or be heard by the angst-ridden teenagers.  They roamed the hallways and then back down to the cafeteria, they briefly went into the school kitchen and then they walked back up the staircase and into the south hallway.

12:00pm

Eric and Dylan re-enter the library.  They expected that everything there would be as they left it, but what they found was a library almost completely empty of survivors, save for Patrick Ireland who was still unconscious and the very injured Lisa Kreutz.  The pair returned to the broken exterior windows and at 12:02pm, they popped off a few more rounds at the police still out in the senior parking lot.  Police responded with a few shots of their own, once again no one was hit during this exchange of gunfire. 

The newly elected Jeffco Sheriff, John Stone was in charge of the scene, which really upset some of the other departments, like the state police.  Sheriff Stone was like a character out of an old John Wayne movie and he looked the part as well, but Stone was mostly a politician.  The SWAT team sat, eager to move in and end this massacre, but no one would give them the green light, until just after noon.  The SWAT team used one of the firetrucks as cover, one SWAT member drove the truck slowly up to the building as the rest of the team huddled along the back side of the truck for cover.  When they reached the entrance the group split in half, 6 officers laid back to lay down suppressive fire and the other 6 charged inside.

The time is now 12:06pm.

When the SWAT Team entered the building, Lieutenant Manwaring instantly became confused.  He had been in this building many times and he thought that the point where they had made their entrance was just next to the cafeteria, but Manwaring was unaware that the school had recently been remodeled and the cafeteria was now all the way on the other end of the school.  The SWAT team made it way through the building meticulously and oh so slowly.  

Many bodies remained laying in the grass outside of the cafeteria, some showed signs of life.  At this point Anne Marie, Lance and Sean had been bleeding from their wounds for forty minutes and they were hanging on by a thread.  EMTs moved onto the lawn to retrieve the wounded, but Eric appeared in the second story library window and began firing, the deputies fired back and the EMTs were able to move three victims, Danny was pronounced dead and his body was left behind.

12:08pm was the last reports of gunfire coming from the school.

The police did not know it yet, but the two school shooters had finally ended their tirade through the hollowed grounds of their high school.  Eric Harris sat down with his back against a book self, he positioned his shotgun barrel inside of his mouth and he fired one shot, which escaped through the top of his head.  Dylan Klebold, on his knees used his TEC-9 and shot himself in his left temple.

The rest of the SWAT team began making its way around the building, still using the firetruck for cover.  It would take them half an hour to get to the opposite side of the building.  At 12:35pm they pull Richard Castaldo from the lawn and then they attempted to reach Rachel Scott, the SWAT team pulled Rachel’s body back as far as the firetruck before realizing that she was already dead, they left her body there.  Then the team reached Danny Rohrbough, they moved his deceased body to the sidewalk and left him there.

Another SWAT Team arrived and took the building from the senior parking lot side, shocking to them, they found a lot of terrorized, but safe people hold up inside of the building.  At least 200 to 300 students were still in the school, some had barricaded themselves into rooms, closets or anywhere there was a door they could lock or block, but some were just out in the open, hiding under tables or behind walls.  

No one knew at this point that the threats in this situation had already neutralized themselves, and clearing the massive building was going to take forever.  And then, just before 2:30pm, an officer riding along with one of the news helicopters spotted movement inside of the library. It was a male and he could be seen moving just inside of the blown out exterior windows.  The male was moving in a peculiar way and he seemed to be propped up by the window frame, while at the same time, brushing shards of glass away from the window frame, and he was covered in blood.  This was Patrick Ireland, he was still alive, but barley and he was not waiting on help, he was getting out of that library, and he was going to do it now.

The SWAT team used the Loomis armored truck to drive up to the building.  “Hang on, kid!” one officer shouted “We’re coming to get you.”  But Patrick was confused, he could hear the voices shouting, but he could not figure out where the voices were coming from, or who they were.  His vision was blurry and blood had matted over parts of his eyes causing blind spots.  Patrick felt like he was stuck underwater and everything was fuzzy and out of focus.  His head was swimming, but all he could think was, get out, get out.  The shots which had been fired into Patrick’s head had lodged a lot of fragments into his scalp, including the buck shot and wood splinters from the table.  One singular pellet had gotten through his skull and it was now sitting 6 inches inside of his brain matter.  The pellet had entered through the left side of his face, just above his hairline and it had stopped just around his middle ear.  Some of Patrick’s optical center was obliterated and he had also lost his ability to speak.  Patrick had also been paralyzed on the right side of his body, this prevented Patrick from even realizing that he had also been shot in his right foot and that it was broken as well.

When Eric and Dylan had left the library and everyone took their chance to escape, Makai and Dan tried to help Patrick, they tried to drag him with them, but both of these boys had been shot in their legs, so strength was at a minimum and Patrick, not realizing he was paralyzed, was just dead weight.  For fear that the shooters may soon return, the boys made the difficult choice to stop trying to help Patrick and think about self-preservation.

Patrick was in and out of consciousness, and he could not understand why his body was not doing what he told it to do.  Patrick reached up with his left hand and grabbed something, and he pulled himself forward, this took everything he had at that moment and he passed out again.   This was a cycle, over and over, Patrick would wake up, he would reach out with his left hand and he would pull himself forward and then pass out again.  Patrick was not even sure what he was trying to do himself, he started less than two tables away from the windows, but he was moving for some time in the wrong direction.  He encountered tables, chairs and bodies.  He was forced to either push these things out of the way or he had to work his way around them.  Patrick just knew one thing, get out, head towards the light, the light is outside.  Patrick Ireland finally made it to the windows, but it had taken the dying boy three hours to get there.  There was a chair located next to the window, he pushed off of some solid things around him until he was propped up between the large glass window panes.  Patrick knew he needed to get out of this window, but there were two problems, one he was on the second floor and two, the window was waist heigh and he could not pick his own body up to clear the height.  In his head he had come up with a plan to escape, he would flop the top half of his body over the window and allow the rest of his body to just tumble after it.  Patrick also knew he didn’t want to get hurt, which was why he was wiping away all of the broken glass.  This is when he heard someone shouting “Stay there! We’re gonna get you.”  The commandeered armored truck was now positioned below the window, but the SWAT team was still exiting the vehicle and setting up to assist Patrick’s escape. In Patrick’s confused state, he heard the SWAT team say “OK! It’s safe! Go a head and jump.  We will catch you.”  The SWAT team says that this never happened and when you watch the video of this rescue, you can tell that the team is still getting out of the truck when Patrick leans forward and collapses out of the window.  The ledge catches Patrick around his waist and the severely injured boy is now left dangling out of the window, bent in half at the waist, feet and head pointed perilously toward the ground.  

The officers climbed on top of the truck as quickly as possible and they reached up and grabbed Patrick’s hands just as the confused teenager began kicking his good leg, attempting to get unstuck from the window.  The officers held Patrick’s hands as the boy plummeted from the window, his bloody body landed with a dramatic thud against the side of the truck.  As more officers helped the boy down to the hood of the truck, Patrick fought and kicked still trying to get away from the melee from which he had just left.  As the officers pulled Patrick upright, they became confused as to why the boy was fighting back at them.  They got him to one of the triage sites and he was placed directly into an ambulance.  As paramedics began working on Patrick, during his ride to St. Anthony Central Hospital, they cut away all of his cloths.  They were able to confirm gunshot wounds to his left forehead and his right foot, his elbow was ripped open.  Patrick could only use one side of his mouth and what came from his mouth was confusing to say the least.  Patrick could not even say his own name, the most he could get out sounded like Rick Ireland.

While the SWAT team on the outside of the building was in the throws of rescuing Patrick, the team who had breached the building was now at the choir room.  Here there were 60 students barricaded inside.  After a few minutes 60 more students were located in the science area of the school.  

Next Thursday, on The Secret Sits, as police take the school, mourning the dead becomes controversial and answers are reviled.