eBay Yanks Auction for Columbine Killer’s Car

In another sad attempt to gain notoriety from someone else’s pain, someone placed an auction on eBay to sell the car that once belonged to one of the gunmen in the Columbine High School shootings. eBay removed the ad for the 1982 BMW 320i, saying that although it has no problem with the owner selling the car, it does have a problem with the sellers using that fact as a teaser to lure people into the auction. The company said that the auction violates eBay’s policy on auctions featuring "murderabilia." The owner can sell the car on eBay, but only without saying that it was once owned by a murderer.

Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris drove the car to Columbine High School on the morning of April 20, 1999, leaving two 20-pound propane tank bombs, fuses, and seven pipe bombs in it, according to investigative reports. The two walked through the school on a murderous rampage in the nation’s worst school shooting, leaving 12 students and a teacher dead. Klebold and Harris took their own lives at the end of their killing spree.

The sellers of the car, who have chosen to remain anonymous, have created their own website to put the car up for sale. The website shows a variety of pictures of the car, as well as the title with the signatures of Thomas and Susan Klebold, Dylan’s parents. Evidently the vehicle was impounded during investigations of the shootings, and then returned to the Klebolds about a year after the shootings. It was donated by the Klebolds to Vehicles for Charity, who then sold it at auction.

The sellers make a pitiful attempt to sound as though they’re not capitalizing on the Columbine tragedy. "We are not trivializing the incident or disrespecting the victims or their families," their website says. "We feel deeply for all of the victims and as I've done research into the incident and learned more about all that happened it boggles my mind as to how someone could come to that. That being said, we're not going to burn the car or trash it in any other way simply because we're not rich enough to buy a car and just trash it. Whoever buys this car can do whatever they want with it. It was the car that Klebold and Harris drove to the high school in that day with their bombs, guns, and ammo."

An eBay spokesman would not answer questions about whether or not the company will take any action against the sellers of the car. The eBay auction description had said that the sellers did not know the vehicle’s history when it was purchased, but once they learned who had originally owned the car, they decided to sell it. The sellers say that they are not trying to make money off other people’s pain, which is obviously a blatant lie. They have scheduled the auction to end exactly on the seventh anniversary of the Columbine shootings, April 20th.

The sellers of Klebold’s car say that they have gotten many complaints about auctioning off the vehicle. They might even post some of the e-mails they’ve received. "If we get enough hate mail over it, we might have to post a 'Best Of' section cause frankly, some of you people are hilarious. Happy Bidding!" their Web site states. The website address is not provided here, because they’re already getting enough free publicity for their appalling decision to take advantage of a horrific tragedy in order to sell a car.