Dave Cullen

Dave Cullen is an American journalist and author best known for Columbine (2009), widely regarded as the definitive account of the 1999 school shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. Cullen covered the shooting as a journalist beginning the day it occurred and spent ten years reporting, investigating, and interviewing survivors, families, law enforcement, and mental health experts before publishing his landmark book. Columbine won the Goodreads Choice Award for Nonfiction in 2009, the Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism, and numerous other prizes. It is taught in journalism schools and used in crisis counseling training, and has been credited with correcting many of the myths and misconceptions that initially surrounded the attack. Cullen's meticulous reconstruction of the killers' psychology and the survivors' long aftermath set a new standard for trauma journalism. Cullen's subsequent book, Parkland (2019), brought a similar methodology to the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, following students who became prominent gun-control advocates. He is a regular contributor to major American newspapers and magazines and is considered one of the preeminent journalists covering gun violence in America.