While Columbine High School shooting survivor Anne Marie Hochhalter’s life was shaped by tragedy, the tenacious woman worked hard to ensure tragedy did not define her.
Hochhalter was 17 when her life shifted from teen clarinet player to among the most injured survivors of the 1999 Columbine High School shooting. The high school junior was paralyzed after being shot in the back. She spent the rest of her days in a wheelchair with medical complications.
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Columbine survivor Anne Marie Hochhalter remembered by family, loved ones
Six months after the shooting, her mother, Carla Hochhalter, walked into an Englewood pawnshop, asked to see a revolver and fatally shot herself.
Amid the media frenzy, medical care and grief, Anne Marie Hochhalter was determined to live life on her own terms. She went on to find her new normal, living independently in a handicap-accessible home with dogs to love and friends to cherish.
Anne Marie Hochhalter, 43, was found dead in her Westminster home Sunday.
Read the full story from our partners at The Denver Post.
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