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14-Year-Old Sentenced In Columbine-Like Plot

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The Associated Press

Published: December 20, 2007

NORRISTOWN, Pa. - A 14-year-old boy who admitted that he planned a Columbine-style attack on a high school outside Philadelphia was sentenced Wednesday to as many as seven years in a juvenile treatment facility.

Dillon Cossey will remain in the facility until he turns 21, unless the courts decide he has been sufficiently rehabilitated before then, Montgomery County Judge Paul Tressler ruled.

The boy apologized in court for amassing a cache of weapons and plotting the assault on Plymouth Whitemarsh High School. Authorities do not think Cossey was close to pulling it off; he had no ammunition.

"I am very sorry, but I do want to get help," Cossey told the judge. "I also hope that me and my family as a whole can get help."

Dillon admitted in juvenile court in October that he committed three felonies - criminal solicitation, risking a catastrophe and possession of an instrument of crime.

Dillon, who was arrested in October, felt bullied and tried to recruit another boy for a possible attack at Plymouth Whitemarsh High School, authorities said. He was home-schooled and last attended public school in the seventh grade.

He told a friend that he wanted to pull off an attack similar to the 1999 assault on Columbine High School, saying "the world would be better off without bullies," according to prosecutors.

In court, the judge said Dillon's mother, Michele Cossey, had created a "me and mom against the world" attitude in her son.

"This kid has been so totally desocialized, he has no friends," Tressler said.

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