A 13-year-old girl died by suicide. Her mom says she was part of 'the Columbine effect'
Editor’s note: This article discusses suicide and suicidal ideation. If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org.
FLORENCE, Ky. – Audree Heine loved to sing Taylor Swift songs. She had a celebrity crush on Eminem. She wore a bright pink cowgirl hat to her 13th birthday party last year.
A week after she turned 13 in December, she died by suicide. That's when her mom, Jaimee Seitz, learned Audree was also part of an online subculture – one that idolizes the two black-trench-coat-wearing teens who killed 13 people at Columbine High School in 1999.
"I'm her mom. I'm her best friend. She's my best friend," Seitz told The Enquirer, part of the USA TODAY network. "What did I miss and how did I not know she was a part of this group?"
Seitz learned this when she read her daughter's journal, which she had kept in her middle school locker. Among pages of writing about her fascination with the Columbine shooters, she wrote about her deteriorating mental health and bullying.
"I'm so sick of this, I don't even fight back anymore. I just accept it," the seventh-grader wrote in the fall of 2024.
Her feelings of being outcast and picked on led her to a subculture known as the True Crime Community, where she believed a lie about the two shooters who launched the modern, online age of school shootings, her journal revealed.
This teen tried hiding his autism. His parents think it drove him to suicide.
What is the Columbine effect?
Columbine expert Dave Cullen has addressed the subculture, known as TCC or TeeCeeCee online.
In a recent article he wrote for The Atlantic, he said TCC followers are taken in by the myth that the Columbine shooters were misfit teens who took revenge on their bullies.
"The TCC twists the story to recast the murderers as victims; and the dead, wounded, and traumatized as villains," he wrote. "But the killers never mentioned it in the huge trove of journals, online posts, and videos they left to explain themselves."
At least 50 mass shooters over the past 25 years have been inspired or influenced by Columbine. Hundreds have been killed or wounded as a result, he wrote.
Cullen calls that influence "The Columbine effect."
Seitz became aware of the extent of that subculture about two weeks after her daughter died. That's when two people were killed and six injured during a school shooting in Madison, Wisconsin.
The shooter appeared to have been involved in the same TCC subculture as her daughter – something Seitz recognized when she saw photos of the shooter wearing the same kind of T-shirts Audree had asked her mom to make for her.
"This isn't normal. Why is this all allowed?" Seitz says. "This is a whole different realm."
She couldn't help thinking that without TCC and its focus on mass violence and self-harm, Audree might still be alive, she said. Since then, Seitz has spent hours on TikTok reporting TCC-related videos and accounts for violating community standards.
More videos pop up daily.
Her daughter's suicide shocked her. Now, she's raising awareness.
How TikTok pulls in young people like Audree
Audree's TikTok account was banned the same night she died.
Seitz suspected Audree may have tried to livestream or post a video of her actions to TikTok. It's where the teen found accounts that glorify self-harm and suicide.
Researcher Lisa Dittmer, of Amnesty Tech, told The Enquirer that TikTok's algorithm prioritizes and amplifies videos that show young people posting about their mental health issues. This can include teens crying, contemplating self-harm, and even harming themselves or others.
She co-authored a 2023 study to prove it.
During the study, dozens of accounts were created to mimic a 13-year-old's TikTok profile. Some of the accounts were run by artificial intelligence. Others were run by researchers.
Any TikTok videos tagged with mental health terms were watched twice.
"In our investigation on TikTok, we found that within 20 minutes, 50% of the content was all about depression, sadness, pain and suicide," Dittmer says.
Some of those videos explicitly encouraged self-harm and discussed methods of dying by suicide, she added.
Some countries have taken note of the harmful effects of TikTok and other social media websites.
In the European Union, a law called the Digital Services Act went into effect last summer. It requires companies with digital operations to take more responsibility for what is posted to websites and social media.
According to The Guardian, the law forces the companies to be "legally accountable for everything from fake news to manipulation of shoppers, Russian propaganda and criminal activity including child abuse."
One part of the new law prohibits the companies from targeting children with advertising based on cookies or personal data. It also requires social media companies to increase privacy and safety for minors and reduce safety risks to children.
That's the kind of change Seitz wants to see in the United States – more accountability from social media companies.
'Feeding off each other'
Seitz was devastated to learn from police that the teens Audree was talking to online, fellow TCC followers, knew she planned to die by suicide and did nothing to discourage her.
According to a report from the Florence Police Department, Audree's interest in TCC and chats with other teens were found after a digital scan of the teen's phone when she died.
Seitz said that's around the time Audree's aunt Chasity Wiseman insisted on asking the FBI to investigate.
The FBI did not answer emailed questions from The Enquirer, but confirmed the agency had been in contact with the Seitz family.
Seitz says the FBI scanned Audree's phone again and it led them to intervene in a possible terrorist attack in Indiana. Two of the teens Audree had been chatting with were planning to bomb their school, located less than 150 miles away, Seitz says.
The Florence Police Department report confirms information was shared with an Indiana-based police agency due to a scan of Audree's phone.
"It was like they were feeding off of each other, and nobody stopped either of them," Seitz says.
Seitz can't know whether Audree knew that threat was credible. But she also can't imagine Audree would ever hurt anyone.
Now, Seitz said, it's clear to her that Audree must have had unaddressed mental health issues.
At the time, though, she thought her daughter was just still figuring out her life. She was only 13.
Audree would wear cowgirl boots one day. Then, she'd wear one of her favorite T-shirts from Hot Topic with baggy jeans and a fluffy tail attached to it. The next day she'd dress preppy or insist on blasting music by '90s rapper Eazy-E.
Less than three months before Audree died by suicide, she wrote in her journal about helping a friend who was harming herself.
"I obviously told someone (which was horrifying actually) and im hoping she gets better," Audree wrote about her friend.
That gave Seitz some solace – that her daughter may have stopped a friend from dying by suicide. She also finds comfort in something an FBI agent told her. The teens who planned to blow up their school in Indiana are in counseling now and lives might have been saved because of that.
That's why she's adamant about sharing Audree's story.
If a parent is able to recognize their teen's interest in the Columbine shooting or the TCC subculture, Seitz says, even more people can be saved.
Suicide Lifeline: If you or someone you know may be struggling with suicidal thoughts, you can call the U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988 any time, day or night, or chat online.
Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7, confidential support via text message to people in crisis when they text "HOME" to 741741.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: A mom blames the Columbine effect for her teen daughter's suicide