Bullying and Depression - Essay Example

With today’s emphasis on bullying and bullying prevention and zero tolerance in schools, there may have been a different outcome today to this tragedy, if there were some form of anti-bullying education, awareness, or school policies implemented at Columbine and grammar school, to prevent Harris and Klebold from reaching the boiling point. That being said, the actions they chose to respond to their bullying with are far beyond any rationale in response to bullying. Obviously, many factors beyond mere bullying were involved in their decision to open fire on a school, taking 13 lives, as well as their own.

Seeing the amount of carnage, the planned attack, the amount of detail and thought, and the pre-planning they put into the attack, I would recommend the harshest response possible to their crimes, utilizing a transfer, waiver, or certification to adult criminal court for each of the two defendants. They must face the consequences of their decisions and be held accountable for the actions that require them to be tried as an adult. Once in adult criminal court, they would likely be charged with first-degree murder, with malice aforethought, as there was intent to plan and carry out the murders, they did carefully plan and executed by both defendants.

There were men's rea (guilty mind) and actus reus (guilty act). If convicted, sentencing should be in line with adult criminal standards, with some mitigation regarding the fact they were bullied throughout their school years, and the schools obviously did not address it and allowed it to fester on. The bullying happened under their watch, for an extended period of years. The defense will surely bring on expert testimony about their state of mind and perhaps even temporary insanity. But with the degree of planning and detail that went into it, that argument would be tenuous at best.