GOLDEN, Colo., -- A judge on Friday sentenced a 22-year-old man to six years in prison for selling an assault weapon to two teenagers who carried out the Columbine High School massacre in April.
Dozens of friends and relatives of the victims applauded as Mark Manes was escorted out of the courtroom, the first person imprisoned in connection with the April 20 massacre in which 15 people were killed, including the two teenage gunmen, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold.For some the sentencing was a substitute for the murder trial that will never be held.
"They robbed this community of the ability to punish them," Manes' defense attorney Robert Ransome told the judge, referring to Harris and Klebold.
But the sentiments of the two gunmen were heard in court when prosecutors read from transcripts of videotapes they left behind, thanking Manes for his help in obtaining a TEC-DC9 semiautomatic weapon used in the bloodbath.
Prosecutors said Klebold killed four people and wounded two others with the TEC-DC9. It fired 55 rounds during the rampage.
"I do not act out of anger today," Judge Henry Nieto said, but added that he was giving Manes the maximum because the shooting was an example of "the worst that could have occurred" as a result of furnishing a weapon to a young person.