Friday, May 9, 2008
On the eve of the massacre's anniversary, a flurry of lawsuits by victims' families allege that law enforcement killed a student -- and failed to save many more.
Apr 20, 2000 | On the eve of the Columbine massacre anniversary, stunning new allegations about the killings emerged from long-expected lawsuits filed by victims' families late Wednesday. They include charges that a law enforcement officer, not Dylan Klebold or Eric Harris, killed student Daniel Rohrbough, and that officers knew early on that Klebold and Harris were dead, and thus could have saved teacher Dave Sanders, who bled to death four hours after he was shot.
Attorneys for Rohrbough's family said they based the suit on eyewitness reports by a teacher and law officer, the position of the body and autopsy results showing the trajectory of the fatal bullet. The suit by Sanders' family alleges that a sharpshooter had Klebold in his sights in the library, but his supervisors wouldn't allow him to act. It also contends the sharpshooter saw Klebold and Harris commit suicide, and thus officers were aware the pair was dead three hours before Sanders died, but failed to rescue him.
The Rohrboughs' lawsuit, joined by five other victims' families, also alleges that most of the deaths in the massacre could have been avoided. It says students could have easily fled the library early on, but a 911 operator had teacher Patti Nielson instruct them to stay put, and alleges they would have survived if they had not been told help was on the way.
Sheriff's spokesman Steve Davis said there is no evidence to substantiate the families' claims. But the new details have led many to question the reason for the sheriff's department's delay in releasing its official report on the Columbine investigation.
A powerful voice has joined the growing chorus of exasperation over delays in the long-awaited investigation report. Principal Frank DeAngelis shared his frustration in an interview with Salon News, just days before the flurry of lawsuits began.
"We keep getting ready, I keep telling the community, 'OK, we're about two weeks away, we're two weeks away,' and keep preparing them," DeAngelis said. "There's only so many times you can get so wound up saying, 'Oh, I'm ready now, I'm ready,' and then all of a sudden, 'No!' 'I'm ready.' 'No.' I think there's a level of frustration."
Jefferson County District Judge Brooke Jackson granted access to the draft report to families of two victims Monday, and extended the ruling to include all victims' families Tuesday. The families of Rohrbough and Kelly Fleming had sued the county for the information last week, in order to assess wrongful-death or negligence cases against the sheriff's department before the statute of limitations runs out Thursday. By the end of the day Wednesday, 15 families had filed lawsuits against the department, and as many as 20 are expected by the end of the anniversary deadline.
In his interview before the lawsuit filings, DeAngelis said his frustration over the repeated delays was shared by faculty, students and members of the community.
"I feel very badly for the families of the murdered," DeAngelis said. "Because they have been waiting over the past year for that to come out. All of a sudden, the parents were ready to look at the police report before Christmas, and then [the sheriff's department] was saying in January, and then it was going to be March, and then April, now it's May, it may be the summer. And you kind of build yourself up -- they know it's not going to be pleasant, but you kind of prepare yourself for it, and then it's kind of a letdown.
"It's the same thing with me. That police report will always be associated with the 13 that were murdered. And that's what's awful, but at the same time, it's going to allow us to see exactly what happened. From that standpoint, I'm looking forward to the police report."
DeAngelis has a personal stake in the report's release. In the days and weeks after the killings, Columbine High itself was forced to share some of the blame, as some speculated that Klebold and Harris had been bullied and tormented by school jocks. Others wondered how DeAngelis could have been unaware of the so-called Trench Coat Mafia, which in those early days was said to have been the clique that hatched the killers.
The principal was briefed on key findings of the investigation throughout the days and months following the massacre, and has spent the past year waiting for many of the notorious rumors to be dispelled. "I said from day one, I truly believe, that when the truth comes out, I'll be exonerated from all the accusations, and Columbine High School will be exonerated," he said. "People have said, 'Aren't you fearful of this police report?' And I said, 'No, I want the truth, I want to know what the investigation states.'"
So many myths gained public currency last spring that most of the public misunderstood key aspects of the case, which dominated national news for months. Yet through it all, the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department remained officially tight-lipped, taking no significant steps to correct the rumors and responding only to limited questions. Some reporters were able to crack the wall of silence, however, to reveal that the killers were not members of the Trench Coat Mafia, and had not singled out jocks, African-Americans or Christians in their killing spree.
Still, the school may not get the exoneration it hopes for. Division Chief John Kiekbusch, the ranking officer overseeing the case, said in September that the report would offer facts without conclusions and has consistently repeated this mantra, leading many to conclude that the report will avoid many of the tragedy's most burning questions, such as the killers' motives and whether the persistent charges of an abusive jock culture within the school are true.
DeAngelis is clearly hoping for much more. "I think what we're going to find out -- without me knowing what's in that police report, other than what I've read in the newspaper -- I think you're going to find out that there were a lot of myths out there," he said. "And I think those myths are going to be dispelled just by what they found out in the police report. They're going to find out that these two murderers did not target a person. They just hated everyone, and they were out to kill as many people as possible.
"And I think you're going to find out that this whole Trench Coat Mafia, this so-called organized gang, was a loose term used for a group of kids who had graduated a year before. The athletic thing -- [critics of the school] want to talk about two or three incidents that occurred, and they keep referring to those, and because of those two or three, there's a jock problem. So I think what the police report will show is that, boy, there were a lot of rumors out there, and people just wanted to believe [them]."
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