Active Shooter Incident Analysis

On April 20, 1999, the unimaginable occurred at Columbine High School in the small town of Littleton, Colorado. A school shooting, perpetrated by, then senior students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold took the entire community by storm. With 15 deaths, including the perpetrators, and 24 non-fatal injuries, the memories of this horrific massacre will forever resonate in minds of all. With a meticulously, thought out plan, the two shooters prepared guns and bombs before performing the sickening act. Families, the FBI, local officials, psychologists,

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) classifies an active shooter event as “one in which one or more persons actively engages in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area” (FBI, 2017). All active shooter events in the United States during

Each year law enforcement officers throughout the county are involved in shootings, some of them fatal. Frequently the shootings are reported by the media, which exploits the feelings of the victim while ignoring the effect of the shooting on the police officer. It is “estimated that approximately 87 percent of all emergency service personnel will experience a critical incident at least once in their career, which include officer-involved shootings” (Kureczka, 2002, p. 18). Officer-involved shootings have a profound effect on not only the officer involved but also their spouses, families, and the departments they serve. Law enforcement officers that are involved in officer-involved shootings need support and assistance such as critical incident stress debriefing and sometimes long-term trauma recover therapy in order to cope and live successful lives beyond the critical incident of the shooting.

An active shooter is defined as, “an individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area; in most cases, active shooters use firearms(s) and there is no pattern or method to their selection of victims”. (U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2008) Most often active shooters events will end quickly, “active shooters will continue to move throughout building or area until stopped by law enforcement, suicide, or other intervention. (Deputy Les Wiemers, n.d.)

Tuesday April 20th, 1999 began like any other day. Parents went to work, and the children went off to school. Neither worried about the other, or how their day would turn out. But, hours later everything changed (“Columbine Highschool Massacre.”). Little did the residents of Columbine, Colorado know their high school would be a statistic for one of the largest school massacres in US History. On this day, two teenage boys were responsible for killing 12 innocent students and a teacher, wounding 23 more students, and then killing themselves (Miller). While a horrific event, the Columbine tragedy improved the safety in schools by upgrading security systems, improving administration’s knowledge on school security, and increasing

Research in school shootings have been administered in many categories, including sociology, psychology, and etc. past studies, and direct later studies in school shootings, offers a sociology stand point for understanding the differences of school shooting incidents, including rampage shootings, mass murders shootings, and examining the mass media dynamic of school shootings; as well as presenting a combination of causes said in the research, including those on the individual, community, and social levels. Suggestions for studies in the future in school shootings are still yet to be explored.

“Shooting massacres” in school settings, a new phenomenon within the past 50 years, are extremely rare events. Over 23 years, 1990-2012, 215 fatal school shooting incidents resulted in 363 deaths, equivalent to 0.12% of national firearm homicides during that time period …… Among these, just three shooting rampages – Columbine High School, Virginia Tech University, and Sandy Hook Elementary School – accounted for 72 (53.3%) of these 135 deaths. The frequency of random/ rampage shooting incidents in schools has remained within the narrow range of 0 to 3 episodes per year.” (Shultz, et al., 2013, p. 84)

Columbine High School Shooting: Why did Columbine occur and what can be learned from it?

“The gunpowder was still lingering in the air as San Bernardino Police Lt. Mike Madden and three other officers approached a conference center where a mass shooting had been reported. Bodies had fallen outside the meeting room in San Bernardino, California,” what these officers experienced on that Thursday evening

The day of the Columbine Massacre is a day that will forever burn a hole in America’s heart. The nation was shocked at the news that on April 20, 1999, high school seniors Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris went on a precisely planned shooting rampage at their school, Columbine High School. This event killed a total of thirteen individuals, including twelve students and one highly heroic teacher, and wounded many. The reportedly troubled boys had often accused others of having bullied them, which raised the question of how apparent the warning signs were of their rampage. Because this incident was one of the first known school shootings throughout the nation, many of its specific details were taken into account to help protect schools all

Policies have changed since the shooting happened in Littleton, Colorado. Before Columbine the primary goal of law enforcement officers before and during a shooting was to set up a perimeter and await arrival of SWAT members (Erickson, 2001). This policy has changed in many states including Pennsylvania where police had been preparing for active shooters with local schools. Police are not able to wait the twenty minutes to an hour for SWAT to arrive at a scene which is why the state mandated that local police receive active shooting training (Coughlin, 2012). This response and a brochure that the Department of Homeland Security came out with are allowing schools a better chance of eliminating a shooter with less causalities and injuries. This brochure goes into to profile of an active shooter, how to respond to an active shooter, how to respond when law enforcement arrives, training staff for an active shooter, preparing for and managing an active shooter situation, recognizing workplace violence, managing the consequences of an active shooter, and lessons learned (DHS, 2008).

Since the day America was shocked to hear reports of a school shooting on April 20, 1999, America’s schools have changed in order provide a safer environment, ease any fears among the public, and protect students. The Columbine Massacre triggered an earthquake of changes throughout the school system. Like any earthquake, the shock was felt, then there may be a few aftershocks, but eventually it subsides and things become more lenient. Is this a problem? To figure this out we must look at the changes the massacre brought, their progression, and furthermore, where we are now.

"I'm angry someone would do this to us. There are lives ruined, families ruined, and our whole school year is ruined" (Brackely 1). Casey Brackely, once a student that attended Columbine High School, remembers the tragedy of the horrific Columbine shooting that killed and injured many students. Mass shootings in the United States have been on the rise since the 1980’s, especially in the last decade. These shooters motives and profiles are almost all terrifyingly alike. Many of these shooters try to imitate and parallel the tragic shooting of the Columbine High School in 1999. These shootings have made peaceful organizations, such as an elementary school; become a place of violence and death. Currently, in the United States, an epidemic of

The first misconception is that the social cliques that occur in high schools across the nation has a role in this tragedy. Columbine is not simply a school shooting but is rather a shooting that the gunmen chose the school as their tool. School shooters tend to act impulsively and attack the targets of their rage mainly the students and faculty. Harris and Klebold planned for a year and dreamed much bigger. The school served as a means to a grander end, to terrorize the entire nation by attacking a symbol of American life. The shooters talk in numerous video tapes about their act being bigger than the Oklahoma city bombings. They boasted about making sure there bloody performance was bigger and more memorable. Klebold is particular was quoted as bragging about inflicting “the most deaths in U.S. history. Columbine was

Armed police are required to become skilled at responding to events that demand the use of firearms (Fyfe, 1981). Arguments arise from the public's failure to recognise the police’s difficulty in making a straightforward judgment as to whether coercive force or the use of guns is required in events (Dick, 2005). When police do use guns, there is a risk that police may misfire and consequently cause more victims as a result (McCulloch, 1989). Furthermore, in circumstances that require force, natural biological impulses kick in; informally known as the fight or