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| Brook as a student | Brook's Book | Brook as a speaker | |
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| Klebold and Brook | Brook signing autographs | Brook on Ophray | |
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| Brown was a friend of Klebold and Harris and made a film about the attack a year earlier. Brown said he ran into Harris at the school entrance and Harris told him to leave. |
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By
Mark EddyApril 20 - Brooks Brown walked out of Columbine High School on Tuesday morning to get a cigarette and instead got a chilling warning from his friend Eric Harris - moments before the killing rampage began.
"I was walking out for a cigarette and I told him, "Hey, man' and he said, "Brooks, I like you. Now, get out of here. Go home.' And so I didn't think twice about it.
"I went to go have my cigarette and heard gunshots, so I took off and started running. I went to random houses, called the cops and told them I knew who it was; it was Eric, it had to have been.''
Harris, who was about 5-foot-10, was wearing a white T-shirt and black cargo pants and was pulling duffel bags out of his car when he told Brown to clear out. And although police hadn't identified the shooters, Brown said he was sure Harris and another close friend, Dylan Klebold, apparently attacked and killed some of their classmates.
"I'm positive he's one of the killers. He had to have been. They said he was leaving duffel bags all over the place with pipe bombs. He had the white T-shirt ... and he had the bags. I'm just positive it's him. He parked in a spot that he never parks in, he ditched (school) with this other guy (Klebold) I'm pretty sure is involved. Oh, my God.''
Brown, his voice cracking, said he'd known Klebold since both were 5.
"The possibility is that one of them ... I am insanely good friends with and have been since I was 5.'' While Harris had shown signs of violence in the past, Brown said he thought those days were over.
"For a long time, I would have thought it possible - but not recently - and I never would have expected this level at all, not even close. And the other person I think is involved (Klebold), definitely not, not even close.''
Harris, who'd just turned 18, and Brown, also 18, had been friends since they were sophomores. But the friendship soured a year ago after Harris threw a piece of ice and broke Brown's windshield, and that's when he showed his dark side, Brown said. When Brown complained to Harris' parents, Harris threatened to kill him, Brown said. "He got (mad) at me and told me he was going to kill me.'' He even went so far as posting a message on his Web site urging anyone who was interested in killing to hunt down Brown. The family called police three times but don't know if they acted on the complaint.
But this year the two boys had a couple of classes together and resumed their friendship, Brown said. "I told him, "Let's bury the hatchet and be friends.' He said that's cool, he was glad that someone's doing that.''
And while Harris - who with his crewcut looked like a "junior Marine'' - had been a jerk up until then, after the overture he seemed to turn a corner, Brown said.
"Recently he's been a lot nicer of a guy. He was a real ---- for a long time, and then when I told him I wanted to bury the hatchet he just started being cool to me and just making jokes and being nice,'' Brown said. "He was just an odd, nice guy, he was kind of nuts for a while, but I mean, the son of a bitch saved my life basically.'' Some are claiming Harris and Klebold were targeting minorities, but Brown said that while Harris often made racist comments, he doesn't think that was the motivation for the shootings.
"He was going after jocks. He hated them with a passion, because they always made fun of him and they always threatened him. They did it especially his sophomore year, and he just hated them.''
Harris - who liked to read, write and play video games - talked constantly in philosophy class of buying a gun, especially since he recently turned 18, Brown said. Harris and Brown's other friend were members of the Trench Coat Mafia, a group of kids who some say were brooding outcasts and misfits. Although Harris had been nice lately, he was filled with hate and there was only one way for this shooting rampage to end, Brown said.
"He did it because he hated people. He loved the moment. He loved killing people, he liked that idea. He lived in that. That's how I knew it would end the way this did - kill all the hostages and then themselves; I couldn't see anything else.''
Denver Post staff writer Don Knox contributed to this report.
Copyright 1999 The Denver Post. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Brooks Brown, a student whom Harris had once been friends with but had later targeted in his rants, saw Harris entering the school the morning of the massacre, and scolded Harris for skipping a class. Harris reportedly said, "Brooks, I like you. Go home." Brooks left the school, headed for his home which was close to the school. When he learned of the shootings later, he phoned the police with what he knew.
Brooks Brown
Brooks Brown graduated
from Columbine High
School in 1999; this is his first book. Brooks worked and consulted on Michael
Moore’s Academy Award-winning documentary
Bowling for
Columbine and is
currently working on a documentary of his own. He lives in Littleton, Colorado.
Because of his friendship with Klebold and Harris, and his actions on April 20, Brooks Brown, a tall, rangy and proud member of the high school's outsider crowd, became one of the most controversial figures to emerge from the crisis of Columbine. Brown and Harris fell out sometime in 1999, after Brooks' parents complained to police about Eric's threats against their son, and Harris put Brooks' name on a "hit list" he maintained on his personal Web site. But on the morning of April 20, when Brown encountered Harris headed into the school, locked and loaded, Harris did not kill him. "Go home, Brooks," Brown recalls Harris saying. "I like you now."
The first time I saw Brown, a couple of days after the shootings, in the cafeteria of a hospital near Littleton, he looked like a zombie. Brown had just left the intensive care unit, where his friend Lance Kirklin was recovering from multiple gunshot wounds. Much of Lance's face had been shot off.
Brown's life, too, would soon change forever. On May 4, 1999, Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone appeared with reporter Dan Abrams on NBC. "I'm convinced there are more people involved," Stone said. "Brooks Brown could be a possible suspect." Abrams asked about the Harris Web pages. Stone scoffed, saying these were a "subtle threat," and denied that the Brown family had ever reported them to the police in the first place.
The Browns interpreted Stone's remarks as an attempt to intimidate them and shut them up, but they refused to be muzzled. Countless press interviews and public records requests later came vindication. Documents surfaced that proved that county sheriff's deputies had indeed visited the Brown home several times prior to April 20, 1999, to hear their complaints about Eric Harris' Web site.
Brown's girlfriend - Meagan Fishell
Now 23, Brown has moved into a suburban development close to Littleton with his girlfriend of four years, Meagan Fishell, 21, a mortgage loan specialist.Fishel
Jewish (Ashkenazic): from the Yiddish personal name Fishl, literally ‘little fish’, used as a vernacular equivalent for the Biblical Efraym (Ephraim). Ephraim became associated with the fish because he was blessed by his father Jacob (Genesis 48:16) with the words veyidgu larov ‘Let them grow into a multitude’, the verb yidgu, containing the root letters of Hebrew dag ‘fish’.A chain smoker with green hair, and a devoted fan of the band Insane Clown Posse, Brown can be found most days in his basement, tinkering with computers, and acting as webmaster for a couple of youth-oriented Web sites. He delivered pizzas for Domino's for a month, the only regular job he's held in the last few years.
One unseasonably warm evening in February, Brown fired up another in a long series of Camel Turkish Jade Lights and settled into a beanbag chair in the basement. We ate Chinese food and drank A&W root beer. Brown was still recovering from six fillings he had earlier in the day, which had required eight shots of Novocain. That much painkiller, it became clear, hadn't dulled his anger toward Jefferson County officialdom.
Although his parents harbor some anger at the Klebolds and Harrises, Brown himself seems not to. In fact, six months after the killings, he says, Brown drove up to the Klebold home, in the wooded foothills outside Littleton. Dylan's parents were there. Sue Klebold served Brown some strawberry shortcake. "I was chilling with Tom and Sue, and we talked about all the different lies the sheriff was telling, and Tom said, 'You know who would be great to get out here? Michael Moore. Go on his Web site -- it has his e-mail. I can't do this because our lawyer won't let us. But that would be awesome.' I sent Michael Moore an e-mail and said, 'I'm this kid from Columbine, you might have seen me on the news. I'd really like to talk to you for a couple of minutes and see if you'd want to come out and do a movie on Columbine.' So Tom Klebold's the reason 'Bowling for Columbine' happened."
Brown would go on to co-write a thoughtful book, "No Easy Answers: The Truth Behind Death at Columbine," which describes widespread bullying at the high school. In a culture of exclusion, loners were singled out for verbal and physical abuse by a coterie of jocks with a swelled sense of entitlement. Brown also assisted Moore with his film, some scenes of which were filmed in and around Littleton. Though Brown admires the film, he feels that Moore didn't give him enough credit for shooting footage used in the movie. "He or the people around him are users," says Brown, who says he was promised an assistant producer credit but received only a simple "thank you."
Columbine became the centerpiece of Brown's life, the driving force behind a constant battle to defend himself and make the world understand what life was like inside Columbine High School in the bloody spring of 1999. The usual post-traumatic conditions presented themselves. Brown struggled with depression, he says; he'd sleep all day one day, then stay up for three. Empty bottles of Southern Comfort 100 and Jack Daniels piled up around the house. "Anything I could get my hands on I would drink and drink and drink." He recently quit drinking, he says, a sign of his recovery.
"I wrote off a lot of my friends after Columbine, and most of my friends wrote me off. Immediately after Sheriff Stone said that I was a possible suspect, a lot of my friends just didn't even want to be seen with me. People would scream out the window of their car that I was a murderer or they'd tell me to get out of here before they killed me. And no one wants to be around that." No evidence of Brown's involvement in the massacre was ever produced, but that didn't stop Columbine administrators from banning him from the high school after he graduated in the spring of 2000. "They thought I was going to kill somebody," he says.
Meanwhile, Brown thinks school officials turned a blind eye to jock-led bullying, which Brown believes led to the tragedy. "For a year after Columbine, the administration said there was no bullying at Columbine," he says. "They just said it never was. Then the governor created a commission that said there was bullying at Columbine. So they came out and said, 'Well, we've solved the bullying problem.' That's the brilliant doubletalk they did for three years, and that was long enough and now no one really pays attention anymore."
Brown lit another cigarette. "It's like beating your head against a wall, trying to get things changed. It's painful. It's so stressful and depressing."
Teen targeted by sheriff denies involvement in school attack
By Katherine Vogt
Associated Press
LITTLETON — A classmate who was harassed and threatened by gunman Eric Harris criticized the sheriff on Wednesday for suggesting that he has withheld information about the Columbine High School massacre.
"They have no evidence against me. They have nothing. Actually, I know that the FBI has said that I'm not a suspect. The DA has said that I'm not a suspect," Brooks Brown said in an interview outside his home.
"Both have said I'm just a witness. I don't know why Sheriff (John) Stone is doing this. ... I just don't think he's thinking before he talks."
In newspaper and national television show interviews, Stone has said he believes Brown, 17, knows more about the April 20 attack at Columbine High School than he has told investigators.
Brown's parents had earlier criticized Stone for failing to act after they had told deputies last year that Harris had threatened their son and had written about bombs and murder on the Internet.
Brown knew Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, and had helped produce a videotape with Klebold.
The day of the shooting, Harris warned Brown to stay away from the school moments before he and Klebold killed 12 students and a teacher, wounded 23 others and then committed suicide.
Brown and his parents, Randall and Judy Brown, swept aside Stone's suspicions and said his comments stemmed from their criticism of his department.
"It's incredible; it's wrong," Randall Brown has said. "He should be ashamed of himself."
Stone was not available for comment, but sheriff's spokesman Steve Davis reiterated Wednesday that no one has been labeled a suspect, including Brooks Brown.
Stone retracted an earlier statement after he said three teens detained near the school on the day of the shooting were suspects. Other officials said the three had been cleared of involvement.
Investigators said earlier this week they were leaning toward the theory that Harris and Klebold acted alone, but Stone said he believes there may have been a third gunman, based on interviews with student witnesses.
Davis said: "We have had a lot of witnesses tell us there was a third suspect and we've said that from day one. But, from day one, we've said we hadn't had any concrete evidence to show that."
Also, Jefferson County Schools Superintendent Jane Hammond said it could cost $50 million to repair damage to Columbine High School.
In the days after Columbine, sheriff's officials openly inquired about whether Brooks Brown might have been involved in the killings. Harris had told him to go home shortly before the attack.
Judy and Randy Brown don't trust the sheriff's department or the final report.
The couple had reported Harris to authorities for making threats on a computer Web site against their son, Brooks Brown. Because of that, they question the authenticity of the report's timeline.
"Why does it start at 11:13 a.m.? asked Judy Brown. "Eric started a year before planning this. He said he was going to do this a year before. He said, 'I'm looking for ground zero.' The police department had that information -- they didn't look into it."
When Harris was about to enter the school just prior to the attack, he encountered Brooks Brown and told him to go home. The Browns said their other son, Aaron, narrowly missed being shot by the attackers.
Mar. 12, 2001
-
Fox News Channel did viewers no favors Friday, showing homemade videos of the Columbine High School killers taped by Brooks Brown - a young neighbor and acquaintance of the shooters - and replaying footage of Columbine students running with hands over their heads, all while interviewing Brown via satellite from Denver.
Brown, asked about the meaning and lessons of Columbine, had this to say: "The whole city of Littleton is based around this weird idea you're supposed to fear reality" rather than learn lessons from it. "It makes you crazy after a while."
The casual nature of the discussion, with no serious followup to Brown's allegations from anchor David Asman, was beneath Denver viewers' expectations in connection with Columbine.
Brown took the opportunity to chat about the "morality" he shared with the killers. It was "not based on religion but based in logic and reason."
Huh? We expect this kind of unsupported jabber from talk radio, but television is supposed to aim a bit higher. It's just another reminder that 24-hour cable news channels really are talk-radio in disguise, with too much time to fill.
Under the heading "Kids Who Kill," the Fox segment gave plentiful airtime to Brown's opinion, allowing him to vent what appears to be residual bitterness toward his town with nothing to promote understanding of the tragedy.
Some people still think Brooks Brown must have been involved. When he goes to the Dairy Queen, the kid at the drive-through recognizes him and locks all the doors and windows. Brown knows it is almost impossible to convince people that the rumors were never true. Like many kids, his life now has its markers: before Columbine and after.
After the shootings, Stone publicly questioned whether Brooks Brown was involved in the plot to attack the school.
There's certainly nothing unusual about that. It's
actually standard FBI procedure to have your son shoot a
training film for a high school
slaughter a couple of years beforehand. It's also standard procedure to
have your other son on hand to eyewitness the crime. Which is why "(Dwayne
Fuselier's) youngest son, Brian, was in the school cafeteria at the time and
managed to escape after seeing one of the bombs explode" (Denver Post,
May 13, 1999).
It should also be noted that another "student who helped
in the production of the film (was)
Brooks Brown" (Associated
Press, May 8, 1999). For those not fortunate enough to be home on the day of
the shooting watching the live cable coverage,
Brooks Brown was the
student enthusiastically granting interviews to anyone who would stick a
microphone in his face.
He claimed to have encountered Harris and Klebold as they
were approaching the school, and to have been warned away by the pair from
entering the campus that day. According to his story, he heeded the warning and
was therefore not present during the shooting spree. Fair enough, but let's try
to put these additional pieces of the puzzle together.
First, we have the son of the lead investigator, who was
obviously a member of the so-called Trenchcoat Mafia, involved in the filming of
a pre-enactment of the crime. Then we have a second son of the lead investigator
being at ground zero of the rampage. And finally we have a close associate of
both the Fuselier brothers and of Harris and Klebold (and a
co-filmmaker) being in the company of
the shooters immediately before they entered the school, this by his own
admission.
And yet, strangely enough, none of them was connected in
any way to the commission of this crime, according to official reports. Not even
Brooks Brown, who should
have, if nothing else, noticed that the pair had some unusually large bulges
under their trench coats on this particular day. At the very least, one would
think that there might be just a little bit of a conflict of interest for the
FBI's lead investigator.
This does not appear to be the case, however, as "FBI
spokesman Gary Gomez said there was "absolutely no discussion" of reassigning
Fuselier, 51, a psychologist, in the wake of the disclosures in Friday's
Denver Rocky Mountain News. "There is no conflict of interest," Gomez said"
(Denver Rocky Mountain News, May 8, 1999). And as no less an authority
than Attorney General Janet Reno has stated: "It has been a textbook case of how
to conduct an investigation, of how to do it the right way" (Denver Post,
April 23, 1999).
So there you have it. There was no conspiracy, there were
no accomplices. It was, as always, the work of a lone gunman (OK, two lone
gunmen in this case). But if there were a wider conspiracy, you may wonder, what
would motivate such an act? What reason could there be for sacrificing fourteen
young lives?
Many right-wingers
would have you believe that such acts are orchestrated - or at the very least
rather cynically exploited - as a pretext for passing further gun-control
legislation. The government wants to scare the people into giving up
their right to bear arms, or so the thinking goes. And there is reason to
believe that this could well be a goal.
It is not, however, the only - or even the primary - goal,
but rather a secondary one at best. The true goal is to further traumatize and
brutalize the American people. This has in fact been a primary goal of the state
for quite some time, dating back at least to the assassination of President John
F. Kennedy on that fateful day in Dallas on November 22, 1963.
The strategy is now (as it was then) to inflict blunt
force trauma on all of American society, and by doing so to destroy any
remaining sense of community and instill in the people deep feelings of fear and
distrust, of hopelessness and despair, of isolation and powerlessness. And the
results have been, it should be stated, rather spectacular.
With each school shooting, and each act of 'domestic
terrorism,' the social fabric of the country is ripped further asunder. The
social contracts that bound us together as a people with common goals, common
dreams, and common aspirations have been shattered. We have been reduced to a
nation of frightened and disempowered individuals, each existing in our own
little sphere of isolation and fear.
And at the same time, we have been desensitized to ever
rising levels of violence in society. This is true of both interpersonal
violence as well as violence by the state, in the form of judicial executions,
spiraling levels of police violence, and the increased militarization of foreign
policy and of America's borders.
We have become, in the words of the late George Orwell, a
society in which "the prevailing mental condition [is] controlled insanity." And
under these conditions, it becomes increasingly difficult for the American
people to fight back against the supreme injustice of 21st century Western
society. Which is, of course, precisely the point.
For a fractured and disillusioned people, unable to find
common cause, do not represent a threat to the rapidly encroaching system of
global fascism. And a population blinded by fear will ultimately turn to 'Big
Brother' to protect them from nonexistent and/or wholly manufactured threats.
As General McArthur stated back in 1957: "Our government
has kept us in a perpetual state of fear ... with the cry of grave national
emergency. Always there has been some terrible evil at home or some monstrous
foreign power that was going to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind
it...."
Perhaps this is all just groundless conspiracy theorizing.
The possibility does exist that the carnage at
Columbine High School
unfolded exactly as the official report tells us that it did. And even if that
proves not to be the case, there really is no need to worry. It is all just a
grand illusion, a choreographed reality. Only the death and suffering are real.
Postscript: As the dust settled over
Columbine High, other
high-profile shootings would rock the nation: at schools, in the workplace, in a
church, and - in Southern California's San Fernando Valley - at a Jewish
community center where a gunman quickly identified as Buford Furrow opened fire
on August 10, 1999. The man, who later would claim that his intent was to kill
as many people as possible, had received extensive firearms and paramilitary
training, both from the U.S. military and from militia groups.
Shooting in an enclosed area that was fairly heavily
populated, Furrow fired a reported seventy rounds from his assault rifle. By
design or act of God, no one was killed and only a handful of people were
injured, including three children and a teenager. None of the injuries were
life-threatening and all the victims have fully recovered.
With a massive police dragnet descending on the city,
Furrow fled, abandoning his rolling arsenal of a vehicle. Not far from the crime
scene, he stopped to catch up on some shopping and get a haircut. Along the way,
his aim having improved considerably, Furrow killed a postal worker in a hail of
gunfire, for no better reason than because he was Asian and therefore
"non-white."
At about this same time, Furrow car-jacked a vehicle from
an Asian woman. Though this woman - besides being obviously non-white - was now
a key witness who could place Furrow at the scene and identify the vehicle he
had fled in, she was left shaken but very much alive. Having taken great risks
to obtain her vehicle, Furrow promptly abandoned it, choosing instead to take a
taxi.
In an unlikely turn of events, this taxi would safely
transport Furrow all the way to Las Vegas, Nevada. Having successfully eluded
one of the most massive police dragnets in the city's history (which had the
appearance of a very well-planned training exercise), and having made it across
state lines to relative safety, Furrow proceeded directly to the local FBI
office to turn himself in. No word yet as to whether Dwayne Fuselier was flown
in to head up the investigation.
Meanwhile, in Littleton, Colorado, the death toll
continued to mount. On May 6, 2000, the Los Angeles Times reported that a
Columbine High student
had been found hanged. His death was ruled a suicide, though "Friends were
mystified, saying there were no signs of turmoil in the teenager's life." One
noted that he had "talked to him the night before, and it didn't seem like
anything was wrong."
The young man had been a witness to the shooting death of
teacher Dave Sanders. His was the fourth violent death surrounding
Columbine High in just
over a year since the shootings, bringing the body count to nineteen. Very
little information was released concerning this most recent death, with the
Coroner noting only that: "Some things should remain confidential to the
family." (Los Angeles Times, May 6, 2000)
On February 14, 2000, two fellow
Columbine
students were shot to death in a sandwich shop just a few blocks from the
school. The shootings, which
lacked any clear motive, have yet to be explained. In yet another incident, the
mother of a student who was shot and survived "walked into a pawnshop in
October, asked to see a gun, loaded it and shot herself to death."
(Los Angeles Times, May 6, 2000)
Unexplained was why the shopkeeper would have supplied her
with the ammunition for the gun. Perhaps she brought her own, though if she had
access to ammunition, chances are that she would also have had access to a gun.
Such are the mysteries surrounding the still rising death toll in Littleton,
Colorado.
Editor's note: It is indeed the government's desire to eliminate the right to keep and bear arms from the American people. The government has a goal for the American people and needs guns out of our hands to carry it out. NEVER allow any legislation to pass which will deny the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution to be destroyed. There's a reason why the framers placed that right in the Bill of Rights. It's to protect you from the government. See the first edition of The Journal of History - (La verdad sobre la democracia) for the demand on child proof weapons to be manufactured instead of what is being manufactured at the present time.
Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone
told USA TODAY that he now believes 17-year-old Brooks Brown may be withholding
information from investigators. The sheriff described the student as a potential
suspect or material witness in the case.
"I believe Mr. Brown knows a lot more than he has been willing to share with
us," Stone said in an interview. "He's had a long-term involvement with (Eric)
Harris and (partner Dylan) Klebold, and he was the only student warned to stay
away from the school on the day of the shooting."
Brown has said he was confronted by Harris minutes before the shooting started
and advised to leave the campus.
Brown's father, Randall Brown, responded angrily to Stone's remarks. He strongly
questioned Stone's motives in light of the family's criticism that the
department failed to respond to their complaints a year ago that Harris
threatened their son and bragged on the Internet of his violent intentions.
Harris used his Internet site to write extensively about his bomb-making
activities.
The Browns downloaded those writings and turned them over to the Sheriff's
Department.
"The only person who says (Brooks) is a suspect is this idiot sheriff," Brown
said in an interview. "Brooks is the one who turned this (Harris) kid in in the
first place. He's just trying to protect . . . his department from getting sued.
He's a loose cannon."
Stone has come under fire for making statements that his spokesman later had to
retract, including one in which he said that three teens arrested near the
school on the day of the shooting were suspects, when, in fact, they had been
cleared of any involvement.
So strained is the relationship with the Browns that all law enforcement
contacts with the family have been assigned to the FBI, authorities said. The
FBI had no comment.
"If Brooks had any knowledge at all,
would he have sent Eric (Harris) in to shoot his brother?" the elder Brown said,
referring to Aaron, who was in the school cafeteria when the attack began.
Stone said the family's past complaints have had no bearing on his suspicions.
When Harris was about to enter the school just prior to the attack, he encountered Brooks Brown and told him to go home. The Browns said their other son, Aaron, narrowly missed being shot by the attackers.
In the days after Columbine, sheriff's officials openly inquired about whether Brooks Brown might have been involved in the killings. Harris had told him to go home shortly before the attack.
Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone has identified one of Dylan Klebold's classmates, Brooks Brown, as a possible suspect in the Columbine High School massacre
that left 13 people. Harris saw Brown outside the school moments before the attack and warned him to stay away.
Brown has repeatedly denied involvement, noting his brother was in the cafeteria when the shooting happened
Meanwhile, Brooks Brown, a classmate who was harassed and threatened by Harris, criticized Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone Wednesday for suggesting that he has withheld information about the massacre.
Sure randy, brook's little brother
was in the cafeteria at that time.
At the bottom of page 5 of your son's book it is writen :
" In that instant, i knew something horrible was happening"
I knew I had to get as far away from there as possible".
"I was running to get as far away from CHS"
Hum....was is brother really in the
cafeteria at this moment ???
It doesn't seems...
Since Tuesday's attack, the parents of Brooks Brown, a classmate of the suspects, have disclosed that they notified the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department eight times last year with complaints that Harris, a neighbor, had threatened their son. The couple, Randy and Judy Brown, said that after Harris chipped the windshield of their son's car, he created a computer game that revolved around destroying the Brown house and created a Web site that featured a death threat against their son and accounts of manufacturing and exploding pipe bombs.
I applaud Brooks Brown for writing this. He was a longtime close friend of Dylan Klebold and had a like/hate relationship with Eric Harris (Harris once posted death threats against Brown on his website). He was also targeted as a possible "third suspect," though there turned out to be no evidence supporting this. He gives incredible insight into the personalities of Harris and Klebold (and Rachel Scott, who he greatly respected. His writings confirm much of what Scott's parents write).
It should also be noted that another "student who helped in the production of the film (was) Brooks Brown…" (Associated Press, May 8, 1999). For those not fortunate enough to be home on the day of the shooting watching the live cable coverage, Brooks Brown was the student enthusiastically granting interviews to anyone who would stick a microphone in his face.
He claimed to have encountered Harris and
Klebold
as they were approaching the school, and to have been warned away by the pair
from entering the campus that day. According to his story, he heeded the warning
and was therefore not present during the shooting spree. Fair enough, but let's
try to put these additional pieces of the puzzle together.
Jefferson County’s head sheriff John
Stone, speaking with firm conviction
in an interview published June 19, 1999, made it decisively clear once
and for all that he is CONVINCED Harris
and Klebold
had accomplices in
the planning and execution of the shooting rampage at
Columbine
High
School April 20.
|
||
There remain
certain discrepancies in statements made
by Columbine
student Brooks Brown
at various times since the massacre which bear some
hard scrutiny as well.
Brooks Brown,
it must be remembered, was directly
involved in the 1997 video
with the son of the FBI's lead
Columbine
investigator Dwayne Fuselier,
depicting trenchcoated
assassins
slaughtering students at
Columbine
and blowing up the school as a finale.
Earlier, Brown said repeatedly
that he encountered Eric Harris entering
the school just outside an entrance.
He said clearly that Harris had
given him a break and told him to get out of there immediately. Brown
indicates he readily complied.
Yet recently Brooks has said he
was out in the parking lot when
Klebold
and Harris pulled up and saw them
taking bags out of the car. These
"bags" had not been previously mentioned in the version in which Brown
purportedly ran into Harris near a school entrance. It would seem urgent
that these be discrepancies explained.
Brooks Brown’s
tale seems to be taking on some water in a fairly
significant area. There is no intent herein to imply any direct personal
involvement on the part of
Brooks Brown
in the shootings. Yet given the
seriousness of the horror that unfolded that day, the entire situation
must be taken into account, including
Brown’s involvement in the 1997
trenchcoat
massacre video. This makes
Brown's clarification of these
discrepancies all the more critical.
When Eric Harris walked up to Brooks Brown in the Columbine High School parking lot on April 20, 1999, and told him, "Brooks, I like you now. Get out of here. Go home," Brown's life changed forever. Minutes later, Harris and Brown's close friend Dylan Klebold murdered 12 students and a teacher. Brown immediately became the subject of rumor and innuendo, eventually being named as a "potential suspect" by the police. Besides the misery of being falsely associated with the murders,
Dressed in
oiled black leather trenchcoats and
carrying duffle bags
containing two 20 pound propane bombs set to go off at 11:17 AM -- during "A"
Lunch, which was when the cafeteria was the most crowded, according to
Eric's notes
-- Klebold
and Harris headed toward the cafeteria. Just outside the west entrance Eric saw
Brooks Brown,
an old friend of both boys. Eric
told Brooks at that time that he liked him now and that Brooks should leave the
school and not come back. Brooks shrugged the cryptic words off and left -
he had already been on his way out, heading home for lunch (he and Eric both
lived within walking distance of
Columbine
High). Brooks was later seen by witnesses, heading south on Pierce Street.
Other inside dope on dope could be contained in the interviews a Jeffco investigator conducted with former Columbine student Brooks Brown. I say "could be," because the written record of those interviews is missing -- one of the most glaring omissions from the investigative files. Assistant County Attorney William Tuthill's response to a request for the documents was coy: "No report was generated if there was nothing to report."
Actually, the 11,000 pages of investigative files released to date contain countless examples of interviews that generated no new information but were written up anyway. Brooks Brown and his parents -- whose ongoing feud with Stone led to a failed effort to recall the sheriff last year -- say Brooks spent several hours with a Jeffco investigator and an FBI agent, answering questions about his friendship with Klebold and conflicts with Harris. Other police reports make reference to the statements Brown gave in those interviews. But the statements themselves are missing.
Brooks Brown doesn't know what happened to his interviews. He does, however, recall telling the investigators that somebody ought to check out the Subway shop near the high school, which had become a haven for drug dealing. Nearly a year after the massacre, two Columbine teens were murdered in that same sandwich shop. The killings remain unsolved, but speculation that the crime was drug-related continues
The Rohrboughs claim that Taylor's statements to them helps prove that a Denver SWAT officer fired the fatal bullet that killed their son, who was fleeing the school during the massacre.
The report makes only brief mention of Brooks Brown, a 1999 Columbine graduate and the only person publicly named by Sheriff John Stone as a possible suspect. The report does not mention Brown by name but notes that Harris let one "associate" leave the school prior to the shootings.
None of the eyewitnesses named Brown as one of the colleagues they suspect was involved.
To adults, Klebold had always come across as the bashful,
nervous type who could not lie very well. Yet he managed to keep his dark side a
secret. "People have no clue," Klebold says on one videotape. But they should
have had. And this is one of the most painful parts of the puzzle, to look back
and see the flashing red lights--especially regarding Harris--that no one paid
attention to. No one except, perhaps, the Brown family.
Brooks Brown
became notorious after the massacre because certain police officers let slip
rumors that he might have somehow been involved. And indeed he was--but
not in the way the police were suggesting. Brown and Harris had had an argument
back in 1998, and Harris had threatened Brown; Klebold also told him that he
should read Harris' website on AOL, and he gave Brooks the Web address.
And there it all was: the dimensions and nicknames of his pipe bombs. The
targets of his wrath. The meaning of his life. "I'm coming for EVERYONE soon and
I WILL be armed to the f___ing teeth and I WILL shoot to kill." He rails against
the people of Denver, "with their rich snobby attitude thinkin they are all high
and mighty...God, I can't wait til I can kill you people. Feel no remorse, no
sense of shame. I don't care if I live or die in the shoot-out. All I want to do
is kill and injure as many of you as I can, especially a few people.
Like Brooks Brown."
The Browns didn't know what to do. "We were talking about our son's life," says
Judy Brown. She and her husband argued heatedly. Randy Brown wanted to call
Harris' father. But Judy didn't think the father would do anything; he hadn't
disciplined his son for throwing an ice ball at the Browns' car. Randy
considered anonymously faxing printouts from the website to Harris' father at
work, but Judy thought it might only provoke Harris to violence. MORE>>
don't propose to know who Brooks Brown is or what he is made of as a person, but from what I saw yesterday, he seems to be an intelligent, articulate, candid yet disenchanted individual. He is writing a book that will expose what he knows about the Columbine incident. I asked him what the reaction will be when people read it, and he said, in effect, that most people will want to hang him.
He said everyone hates him -- he had 100 friends at Columbine before the shooting and now he has none left. Everyone blamed him for the shooting -- they needed someone to blame. Brooks gave an example. He said when they had a memorial at Red Rocks they were up on a stage, and DeAngelis was talking about how "everyone loves everyone" at Columbine. Then a quiet chorus of, "Brooks is a murderer," erupted within the group of students. "Bullshit", said Brooks, responding to DeAngelis's words.
Brooks made clear his dislike, if not hatred, of Frank DeAngelis. He said if he were standing in the same room with him he would tear him apart. He said when DeAngelis appeared before the Review Commission "he played dumb."
Steve Schwietzberger and Brooks talked about two teachers at Columbine. Steve said he was trying to get a former student to come forward about what she knew. He said in 1998 she was in a class with Dylan Klebold. The teacher of the class, a woman, treated Klebold mercilessly. She would throw him out of the class and leave the rest of the students in tears. Steve said the student who saw this, now attending a local college, was reluctant to speak out about it.
Brooks mentioned another teacher, a man, and if I recall correctly, he was a drama teacher or music teacher. Brooks said this man was sexist and racist -- he gave some examples. He said the public image of Columbine is basically like nothing of what actually goes on inside the school.
Brooks said half the people on the Review Commission could care less about being there -- the other half are quietly infuriated at the sheriff's office handling of the investigation and their refusal to hand over evidence.
At one point, when a group of Jeffco school officials (not related to Columbine) were talking, a couple of the board members started complaining about how Jeffco won't release any tapes related to Columbine. They, like the public, are still in the dark.
I met Judy Brown briefly, but I did not want to pry any further. Maybe I will see them at the next meeting. I think they are worn out. Did you know the recall of Sheriff Stone only garnered a handful of signatures? The Browns ended up submitting two signatures -- both their own. They kept the few others confidential. No one wanted to sign the petition.
I hope the Browns continue on. They see this as a cover-up -- the sheriff's command screwed up, lied, then hid evidence. I believe it is more than that.
I talked with Troy Eid, Chief Counsel to the Governor. He had mentioned in a line of questioning of Al Preciado that bombs with "mercury switches" were found. My jaw dropped. At the lunch break I asked him where he had heard that. He said it may have been mentioned when SWAT members, possibly Bob Armstrong, testified before the Commission a few months ago. He also said when he was at Leawood Elementary -- with Governor Owens on April 20th -- they kept hearing then that the bombs had mercury switches on them. Since the sheriff's office has never mentioned mercury switches officially before, Eid dismissed it. He took the official line and swallowed it without question. I see it differently. I believe this only confirms further that bombs with these switches were found -- advanced military bombs.
There remain certain discrepancies in
statements made by
Columbine
student Brooks Brown
at various times since the massacre which bear
some hard scrutiny as well.
Brooks Brown,
it must be remembered, was
directly involved in the 1997 video
with the son of the FBI's lead
Columbine
investigator Dwayne Fuselier,
depicting trenchcoated
assassins slaughtering students at
Columbine
and blowing up the school
as a finale.
Earlier, Brown said repeatedly that he
encountered Eric Harris entering
the school just outside an entrance. He said clearly that Harris had
given him a break and told him to get out of there immediately. Brown
indicates he readily complied.
Yet recently Brooks has said he was out
in the parking lot when Klebold
and Harris pulled up and saw them taking bags out of the car. These
"bags" had not been previously mentioned in the version in which Brown
purportedly ran into Harris near a school entrance. It would seem urgent
that these be discrepancies explained.
Brooks Brown -- misidentified as a suspect
Friends with Klebold since first grade, he met Harris in ninth grade.
Though he and Harris clashed at one point -- leading Harris to issue an Internet death threat -- they later reconciled.
Brown was walking out of Columbine on April 20, 1999, when he bumped into Harris.
"Get out of here," Harris said. "I like you."
Brown walked away. Moments later, Harris and Klebold opened fired.
That chance encounter sparked suspicion among sheriff's officials and led to a long-running feud between Brown and his parents and authorities.
After all, Randy and Judy Brown had reported to sheriff's officers in March 1998 -- a year before Columbine -- that Eric Harris had threatened their son, that he was talking about building pipe bombs and committing mass murder.
Nothing happened.
Brown was eventually cleared, but his contempt for authorities has not waned.
"It's pretty upsetting," he said. "I learned a lot of hard lessons in the last three years."
After graduating, Brown worked several jobs and went to college for a while.
He is writing a book about his Columbine experience with a collaborator, and he has helped filmmaker Michael Moore with his upcoming movie, Bowling for Columbine.
Though he wasn't physically injured, he was scarred nonetheless.
"It's pretty much all the time, day to day," he said. "It's the kind of thing that I don't think will ever leave me."
By
Charley Able
Denver Rocky Mountain News Staff Writer
GOLDEN -- The parents of a teen once called a potential suspect in the Columbine High killings plan to recall Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone.
Randy and Judy Brown, whose son Brooks was formally cleared of suspicion by the Sheriff's Office in December, said Wednesday they are in the early stages of organizing a recall drive.
Judy Brown picked up recall forms from the County Clerk and Recorder's Office Tuesday.
"We need to get probably 60,000 signatures out of the 300,000 voting public. That's a daunting task," Randy Brown said. "I believe the people of Jefferson County voted Sheriff Stone in not knowing who he was. Now they know who he is and I think they should vote him out."
Stone did not return calls Wednesday seeking comment.
To bring the issue to a vote, the Browns would have to get 41,991 signatures from registered Jefferson County voters, 25 percent of voters who cast ballots in the last election for sheriff, said Faye Griffin, Jefferson County Clerk.
Randy Brown said he has set up no organization to guide the recall effort and has no target date for returning the forms for approval of the petition wording.
"We have not talked to anybody about this. We are still in the planning stages," he said.
"I hope that people who have been complaining come forward. Certainly the signatures are there, but now people have to act on it," Judy Brown said. "We are just going to see what happens and how much help we get."
Once the Browns have the county clerk and recorder's approval on the wording of the recall petition, they would have 60 days to gather the signatures.
The Browns are setting up a Recall Sheriff Stone Hotline phone number -- (303) 550-1141 -- to facilitate the recall effort.
Randy Brown said he and his wife are initiating the recall drive because of "a pattern of misrepresentations the sheriff has made regarding Columbine. I believe it is time to do something.
"I believe he lied to the victims' families about not releasing the videotapes before they (the families) would view them. ... I believe he lied about Jefferson County's involvement with Time magazine, and he lied about my son being a potential suspect."
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who killed 12 of their fellow Columbine students and a teacher before taking their own lives, made a series of videotapes in the weeks before the slayings.
Stone allowed a Time magazine reporter to view the tapes. The sheriff said the reporter promised not to disclose what was on them. But a Time article published in December included excerpts from the videotapes, prompting angry reactions from some parents of Columbine victims and other citizens.
The Browns in 1998 provided deputies with pages of violent rantings they had downloaded from Harris' Web site. Harris also threatened to kill the Browns' son, Brooks.
In the days following the shooting, Stone publicly questioned Brooks Brown's relationship with the killers. He stopped short of calling Brown a suspect but said he was "suspicious" of the teen.
If the county clerk finds enough of the Browns' signatures are valid, an election would be scheduled 45-75 days later.
Griffin estimates the cost of a recall election at $250,000, not including staff time required to validate the signatures.
Contact Charley Able at (303) 892-5020 or ablec@RockyMountainNews.com..
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After the shootings, the Browns publicly blasted the sheriff's office for failing to take their complaints seriously. Stone shot back on the Today show, describing Harris's online invective as a "subtle threat" that wasn't prosecutable. Noting that Brooks had told reporters Harris had warned him away from the school minutes before the attack began, he declared the criticisms a "smokescreen."
"Brooks Brown could possibly be a suspect," Stone said. "Mr. Brown, as well as several others, are in the investigative mode."
The Browns were livid. It was the sheriff who was blowing smoke, they declared, trying to cover up his agency's incompetence by casting suspicion on the very people who'd recognized that Eric Harris was dangerous and had tried to get the cops involved. "Every time we brought up the Web pages, he always diverted attention to us," Randy Brown says now. "Sheriff Stone had absolutely no evidence of Brooks being involved. This shows what kind of person he is."
Brooks Brown wasn't the only one to get the Richard Jewell treatment from Stone and his top brass. The sheriff's off-the-cuff sniping at Harris's parents undoubtedly contributed to their reluctance to speak with investigators for months, and his office's willingness to identify other potential suspects by name, including at least one juvenile, appalled defense attorneys. But Dunaway says that his boss's terminology was accurate, that there were plenty of reasons to suspect Brooks.
"This Brown person is telling us that he is in direct personal contact with Harris moments before the killings begin," Dunaway says. "And Harris tells him that he likes him and that he should leave the school. Then he shows up in a class photo with Harris and Klebold, and they're all pointing fingers at the camera, as if they had guns."
The Browns paid for a private polygraph test to establish that their son had no prior knowledge of the attack; he passed. But to this day the sheriff's office has never formally cleared Brooks; Dunaway will only say there's no evidence "at this time" to connect him to the shootings.
"They're the ones who keep talking about this stuff," he says of the Browns. "They're the ones who went to their own polygraphist, but when our investigator asked for the results and the questions, they refused to give us any of that information. To say they were cooperative with the investigation is not correct. They were not cooperative."
"That's a lie," Randy Brown responds. "We spent hours with the police and the FBI. The only reason they wanted the polygraph results was to try to discredit them. All these people care about is their own reputation. They don't care about anyone else at all."
Over the past year the Browns have sought to assemble the paper trail of their contacts with the sheriff's office, only to find much of it missing or denied to them. They have been told there's no record of any incident report stemming from their first complaint about Eric Harris over a broken windshield (Judy Brown says that deputies contacted the Harrises twice about that complaint). They have been told that the Browns themselves insisted that the Harrises not be contacted about the online death threats. (Randy Brown says he asked that the officers not mention Brooks as the source of the information, for fear of reprisals, but strongly urged them to contact Eric's father.) They have been told that John Hicks, the detective assigned to the case, has no record of meeting with them in his office in March 1998 -- a meeting the Browns recall vividly because, they say, two bomb technicians gave them a quick lesson in pipe bombs and Hicks indicated that his office already had a file on Eric Harris.
According to Division Chief John Kiekbusch, many of the "missing" records the Browns have sought were routinely purged or never existed to begin with. Last spring the sheriff's office issued a statement confirming that a computer check in response to the Brown complaints had failed to turn up Harris's prior arrest for theft; "I cannot verify that a computer check on Harris was done or the information produced by such a check," Stone says now.
Judy Brown says she has been told she can no longer contact clerks in the sheriff's office to make public-records requests like any other citizen, but instead must direct her inquiries to a senior administrator, who hasn't returned her calls in weeks. "The Browns are free to speak with any sheriff's office personnel as appropriate to their inquiry or needs," Stone says.
"Our lives have turned into a really bad X-Files," says Brooks Brown.
For Brooks, the burden of being branded a suspect has never entirely gone away. Students have hissed "murderer" at him on the street and hurled obscenities from passing cars; even a year later, total strangers feel entitled to berate him. An avid debater, he recently returned to Columbine to watch his former team in action, only to be escorted out by a security guard.
"It's been horrible," he says. "I don't think anyone knows how hard it is to
have a best friend that was killed, a really close person like Daniel Mauser,
and you can't go to his parents because they might think you helped kill him. I
was also good friends with Rachel Scott."
After the shootings, the Browns publicly blasted the sheriff's office for failing to take their complaints seriously. Stone shot back on the Today show, describing Harris's online invective as a "subtle threat" that wasn't prosecutable. Noting that Brooks had told reporters Harris had warned him away from the school minutes before the attack began, he declared the criticisms a "smokescreen."
"Brooks Brown could possibly be a suspect," Stone said. "Mr. Brown, as well as several others, are in the investigative mode."
The Browns were livid. It was the sheriff who was blowing smoke, they declared, trying to cover up his agency's incompetence by casting suspicion on the very people who'd recognized that Eric Harris was dangerous and had tried to get the cops involved. "Every time we brought up the Web pages, he always diverted attention to us," Randy Brown says now. "Sheriff Stone had absolutely no evidence of Brooks being involved. This shows what kind of person he is."
Brooks Brown wasn't the only one to get the Richard Jewell treatment from Stone and his top brass. The sheriff's off-the-cuff sniping at Harris's parents undoubtedly contributed to their reluctance to speak with investigators for months, and his office's willingness to identify other potential suspects by name, including at least one juvenile, appalled defense attorneys. But Dunaway says that his boss's terminology was accurate, that there were plenty of reasons to suspect Brooks.
"This Brown person is telling us that he is in direct personal contact with Harris moments before the killings begin," Dunaway says. "And Harris tells him that he likes him and that he should leave the school. Then he shows up in a class photo with Harris and Klebold, and they're all pointing fingers at the camera, as if they had guns."
The Browns paid for a private polygraph test to establish that their son had no prior knowledge of the attack; he passed. But to this day the sheriff's office has never formally cleared Brooks; Dunaway will only say there's no evidence "at this time" to connect him to the shootings.
"They're the ones who keep talking about this stuff," he says of the Browns. "They're the ones who went to their own polygraphist, but when our investigator asked for the results and the questions, they refused to give us any of that information. To say they were cooperative with the investigation is not correct. They were not cooperative."
Another bomb found
Authorities say suspects may have had help in planning massacre
By
Matt Sebastian
Camera Staff Writer
U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno implored the surviving students of this week's Columbine High School massacre to "stand tall" Thursday, saying the grieving teens "have inspired a nation."
"We cannot and we must not become complacent," Reno said after meeting with students and victims' families. "We do not have to accept this violence."
With the investigation of Tuesday's schoolyard slaying of 15 people in its third day, Jefferson County sheriff's officials more than ever believe that suspects Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, may have had help with their shooting and bombing spree.
"We have no concrete evidence that more than two were involved," District Attorney Dave Thomas said. "But it is obvious from the crime scene that it would have been difficult for these two individuals to do this alone."
That belief grew firmer Thursday morning when investigators found another unexploded bomb inside the school's kitchen. It was the biggest yet — a device fashioned from a 20-pound propane tank, a one- or two-gallon gas can and some wiring.
Had it gone off, sheriff's Sgt. Jim Parr speculated, "It would have been devastating."
Police say they believe that Harris and Klebold — armed with four guns and a dozen homemade bombs — walked into Columbine at 11:19 a.m. Tuesday and killed 12 classmates and a teacher before apparently taking their own lives. Twelve more explosive devices were found in the suspects' vehicles.
Officials said 28 other people were transported to seven area hospitals.
"It is a devastating crime scene," the district attorney said. "My 50 years on this earth did not prepare me for this. ... I can only describe it as a war zone."
The question on everyone's lips Thursday remained the same — why? Officials said they still know no motive for the killing spree, although they confirmed that some sort of note was found among some paperwork seized from one of the two suspects.
"I have seen some writings, but I don't know when those were authored," Thomas said, characterizing the prose as typewritten and perhaps from a journal. "I wouldn't necessarily call it a suicide note per se."
Investigators also confirmed that a videotape was seized from the home of one of the shooters.
Columbine student Ben Oakley said Harris and Klebold last semester made a film in their video production class showing them "with their fake guns walking through the halls, shooting jocks."
"Later they animated in the blood," Oakley said. Police wouldn't comment on the videotape seized this week.
Although police have no firm evidence of accomplices or a third shooter — whom some witnesses reportedly saw — they say they believe some of Harris and Klebold's friends may have known of their plans.
"There had been some information exchanged prior to the 20th about what was going on," Thomas said.
No one has been arrested in connection with the rampage, although some of the suspects' friends were detained for questioning Tuesday. Police are interviewing current and former members of the so-called Trench Coat Mafia, the clique that Harris and Klebold belonged to.
Detectives also have interviewed the parents of both suspects. Sheriff's spokesman Steve Davis said both sets of parents have been cooperative, although they have retained attorneys.
The homes of both Klebold and Harris also have been searched. Warrants for both searches have been sealed by a judge, although a hearing will be held today to determine whether to keep the documents under wraps.
At the school, 60 to 75 investigators remained in the bullet-scarred building Thursday, collecting evidence, a process that will last several more days. The team pulled out about 5 p.m. to rest for the night.
Sheriff's representatives spent much of the day defending their actions, as questions arose about the timing of the SWAT entry into the occupied school on Tuesday and the discovery Thursday of another bomb.
"It was not two hours before a SWAT team went in," Davis said, pointing out that one of his deputies was in the school when the shooting started. Several other officers responded within three minutes, and the first SWAT team was in the building in about 20 minutes, Davis said.
Efforts were slowed down by uncertainties about what was happening. A full-scale SWAT entry didn't occur until about 1 p.m., about a half hour after the shooting stopped.
"They had no knowledge of how the suspects were, where they were or how they were dressed," Davis said.
As for the discovery of a new bomb, Barr said the hallways are littered with hundreds of backpacks — each, to police, possibly carrying an explosive.
"There were 2,000 kids in this school that ran out in a panic," Barr said. "Some of them ran out of their shoes."
The search for explosives continues slowly, Davis said, and there is no guarantee investigators won't find more.
On Thursday, students again congregated at Robert F. Clement Park, a few blocks from the school, to mourn their loss.
"I feel like I need to be here," said Josh Nielsen, 17, a Columbine junior. "I can't be away from here."
At about 11 a.m., a group of Westminster High School students arrived at the park, bearing flowers for the several makeshift memorials honoring the dead.
"I didn't know anyone personally from Columbine," student body president Mike Bredenberger said, "but we can certainly feel for them."
Even professional soldiers were moved by the slaughter. A group of infantrymen traveled from Ft. Carson on Thursday to pay their respects.
"We feel like we're part of the community, also," Sgt. Rick Jelen said.
Reno's visit provided a morale boost to the dozens of investigators still processing the massive crime scene, and it was a solace to survivors and the victims' families.
"She said, 'I'm here to listen to the kids,' " said Mary Sautter, the mother of a Columbine student, after meeting with the attorney general at the Light of the World Catholic Church.
Later in the day, Reno appeared at the Jefferson County District Attorney's Office and pledged to seek an end to school violence. But, she cautioned, leaders must "shape remedies that fit the facts."
"The cult of violence, I think, is a notion that has come to accept that violence too often is a way of life."
The attorney general addressed most of her remarks to the students of Columbine High.
"The first thing you're touched by as you go to a community meeting is the students' eyes," Reno said. "They're grieving but they're brave. ... They're an inspiration."
"My message to them is, stand tall."
Camera Staff Writer Jason Gewirtz contributed to this report.
April 23, 1999
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The kids who survived the worst school massacre in U.S. history have graduated, and some of them have even forgiven. But many of their parents have not.
By Peter Wilkinson
The first time I saw Brown, a couple of days after the shootings, in the cafeteria of a hospital near Littleton, he looked like a zombie. Brown had just left the intensive care unit, where his friend Lance Kirklin was recovering from multiple gunshot wounds. Much of Lance's face had been shot off.
Brown's life, too, would soon change forever. On May 4, 1999, Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone appeared with reporter Dan Abrams on NBC. "I'm convinced there are more people involved," Stone said. "Brooks Brown could be a possible suspect." Abrams asked about the Harris Web pages. Stone scoffed, saying these were a "subtle threat," and denied that the Brown family had ever reported them to the police in the first place.
The Browns interpreted Stone's remarks as an attempt to intimidate them and shut them up, but they refused to be muzzled. Countless press interviews and public records requests later came vindication. Documents surfaced that proved that county sheriff's deputies had indeed visited the Brown home several times prior to April 20, 1999, to hear their complaints about Eric Harris' Web site.fishcel
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One unseasonably warm evening in February, Brown fired up another in a long series of Camel Turkish Jade Lights and settled into a beanbag chair in the basement. We ate Chinese food and drank A&W root beer. Brown was still recovering from six fillings he had earlier in the day, which had required eight shots of Novocain. That much painkiller, it became clear, hadn't dulled his anger toward Jefferson County officialdom.
Although his parents harbor some anger at the Klebolds and Harrises, Brown himself seems not to. In fact, six months after the killings, he says, Brown drove up to the Klebold home, in the wooded foothills outside Littleton. Dylan's parents were there. Sue Klebold served Brown some strawberry shortcake. "I was chilling with Tom and Sue, and we talked about all the different lies the sheriff was telling, and Tom said, 'You know who would be great to get out here? Michael Moore. Go on his Web site -- it has his e-mail. I can't do this because our lawyer won't let us. But that would be awesome.' I sent Michael Moore an e-mail and said, 'I'm this kid from Columbine, you might have seen me on the news. I'd really like to talk to you for a couple of minutes and see if you'd want to come out and do a movie on Columbine.' So Tom Klebold's the reason 'Bowling for Columbine' happened."
Brown would go on to co-write a thoughtful book, "No Easy Answers: The Truth Behind Death at Columbine," which describes widespread bullying at the high school. In a culture of exclusion, loners were singled out for verbal and physical abuse by a coterie of jocks with a swelled sense of entitlement. Brown also assisted Moore with his film, some scenes of which were filmed in and around Littleton. Though Brown admires the film, he feels that Moore didn't give him enough credit for shooting footage used in the movie. "He or the people around him are users," says Brown, who says he was promised an assistant producer credit but received only a simple "thank you."
Columbine became the centerpiece of Brown's life, the driving force behind a constant battle to defend himself and make the world understand what life was like inside Columbine High School in the bloody spring of 1999. The usual post-traumatic conditions presented themselves. Brown struggled with depression, he says; he'd sleep all day one day, then stay up for three. Empty bottles of Southern Comfort 100 and Jack Daniels piled up around the house. "Anything I could get my hands on I would drink and drink and drink." He recently quit drinking, he says, a sign of his recovery.
"I wrote off a lot of my friends after Columbine, and most of my friends wrote me off. Immediately after Sheriff Stone said that I was a possible suspect, a lot of my friends just didn't even want to be seen with me. People would scream out the window of their car that I was a murderer or they'd tell me to get out of here before they killed me. And no one wants to be around that." No evidence of Brown's involvement in the massacre was ever produced, but that didn't stop Columbine administrators from banning him from the high school after he graduated in the spring of 2000. "They thought I was going to kill somebody," he says.
Meanwhile, Brown thinks school officials turned a blind eye to jock-led bullying, which Brown believes led to the tragedy. "For a year after Columbine, the administration said there was no bullying at Columbine," he says. "They just said it never was. Then the governor created a commission that said there was bullying at Columbine. So they came out and said, 'Well, we've solved the bullying problem.' That's the brilliant doubletalk they did for three years, and that was long enough and now no one really pays attention anymore."
Brown lit another cigarette. "It's like beating your head against a wall, trying to get things changed. It's painful. It's so stressful and depressing."
