lauren townsend

GREENWOOD VILLAGE -- Dawn Anna held up the blue-and-silver graduation gown her slain daughter, Lauren Townsend, would have worn Saturday. She gently kissed it.

As the empty gown waved in the breeze, many at Columbine High School's commencement ceremony wept for all that should have been.

Anna said she had to finish things for her daughter, who died in the April 20 attack that left 15 dead at the school.

"I was very happy being there. And it was the hardest thing I've ever done," she said.

Lauren was named one of Columbine High's valedictorians, but her parents had to collect the honor.

Her two older brothers and sister, all Columbine graduates, accepted her diploma. They planned to hang it in Lauren's room and celebrate her accomplishments with a graduation party.

"Lauren's the kind of person God wants us all to be," Anna said. "When I grow up, I want to be just like her."

The graduation ceremony was a joyous triumph for 435 seniors. But missing were Lauren and Isaiah Shoels, both shot to death by two other seniors who would have graduated Saturday.

Instead, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 12 fellow students and a teacher before committing suicide one month ago in America's deadliest school shooting.

No one mentioned their names at graduation.

Their actions forever cast a pall over Columbine High, but the graduates at Fiddler's Green Amphitheatre on Saturday were determined to wrest happiness from the tragedy.

Witness Valeen Schnurr.

She suffered nine bullet and shrapnel wounds in the attack. But on Saturday, she looked as if she never had been wounded.

She sat with her classmates and walked victoriously onstage to collect her diploma.

She blew kisses to the cheering crowd.

On the way back to her seat, she hugged Lauren's stepfather, Bruce Beck.

The other graduating survivors of the attack triumphed as well, drawing standing ovations from admiring classmates.

Lisa Kreutz remained in a wheelchair. But, assisted by her parents, she collected her diploma.

So did Jeanna Park, whose wounded arm hung in a satin sling that matched her shiny gown. She walked with a limp but relished her moment of glory.

Robyn Kay Anderson's name was listed on the program, but school officials asked her to stay away, friends said. She attended the Senior Prom with Klebold days before the shooting and bought three of the guns used in the attack.

Principal Frank DeAngelis mourned those who were lost with a moment of silence.

"Their lives were cut down too short," he said.

"Their lives were full of courage and hope and enthusiasm. Each of us will carry the spirit of Isaiah Shoels and Lauren Townsend and Dave Sanders into the future."

DeAngelis told the graduates that the entire nation was with them in spirit Saturday.

Shoels' family chose not to attend the graduation. They had already buried Isaiah in his graduation gown with his diploma and said the graduation would break their hearts. So they mourned in private Saturday.

The morning sky was brilliant blue, and the sun warmed the graduates. As the strains of Pomp and Circumstance filled the outdoor amphitheater, proud parents dabbed their eyes as they watched their children pass by.

Two graduation speakers tried to make sense of the chaos of a month earlier.

Sara Martin told classmates about a beautiful stained-glass window at King's College Chapel in Cambridge, England. During World War II, townspeople fought to save the precious glass by breaking it into numbered pieces.

They carefully stored the pieces until the war ended, then re-created the window.

The Columbine community is like that fragmented window, wounded, but still full of beauty.

"We are being called upon, particularly at this time, to restore the vision, to take our numbered pieces and rebuild the window of our community," she said.

"And, though we have faced disasters of our own, and our window may appear to have been shattered, we can achieve a greater beauty as we put the pieces back together again.

"Let the light shine through the stained glass, colored by these last four years, these last four weeks.

"And, like the people of Cambridge, let us recognize what is worthy to be saved, to be restored, and in unity rebuild the Columbine window from which others may draw their inspiration," Martin said.

She recalled her friend, Cassie Bernall, who was one of those killed April 20.

"I wish that I had had more time and more opportunities to tell her what she meant to me," Martin said. "I must recognize what I have learned: to love deeply and to appreciate every word and every gesture of every person I love or will love."

Jennifer Wallick used the poetry of Robert Frost to remind her classmates that fleeting moments are golden.

She remembered eating pizza with Lauren Townsend during an Advanced Placement English trip to London.

"We had a terrible case of the giggles, and we laughed until our stomachs hurt," Wallick said. "I'll cherish that memory forever."

She remembered, too, the first time she met Isaiah. Her economics teachers saw him walking by in the hallway and pulled him into class.

"This is Isaiah, and he is an awesome person," the teacher said.

"If we remember them all, then they can never leave us," Wallick told her classmates. "Never let them go. They are waiting for us in that realm of pure blue, that mysterious place where the Earth meets the sky."

As the ceremony ended, the graduates gathered on the grassy hillside at the top of the amphitheater.

Together, they moved their tassels from left to right, then they flung their mortarboards, like Frisbees, into the sky.

By MIKE LEBOEUF, Sports Editor
OSWEGO ― It's not just their hitting.

The Baldwinsville Bees also use their defense to swarm past their opponents.

That was on display Thursday as the Bees buzzed past Oswego 25-15, 25-13, 25-14.

"They're a tremendous defensive team, and we just gave them a few too many free balls early in the match," Oswego coach Ron Ahart said. "We weren't able to get our hitting on track as much as we wanted. We hit some really hard balls and they just dug them up. Their forte is their defense."

The Bees were led by Lauren Hartman (18 kills, 2 blocks), Lauren McVey (9 kills, 1 ace), and Laura Galvin (18 assists) as they moved to 16-0 overall.

Oswego, which lost its last three matches of the regular season, still finished 11-5 overall. Ahart said he was pleased with the season as a whole. After competing today in the Central Square Tournament, the Bucs will tune up for the sectionals.

"We do want to get things cleaned up so we're ready to go into the sectionals," he said.

Prior to the match, held at Powers Gymnasium in Leighton Elementary School, the Bucs honored their seniors Melissa Townsend, Cali Maas, Ashley Cahill, and Jessica Mazur.

"Melissa asked to step in at libero and she's been a great defensive player all year," Ahart said. "She's a very good passer and server."

Townsend is second in the league in aces.

Ahart said Maas is a very good back-row defender and the league leader in aces. "She can play any position on the team, and she's an exceptional server," Ahart said.

The coach praised the all-around contributions of Cahill. "She's been a very solid senior. She's a good defensive player. She reads the game well, and keeps us in our hitting game," Ahart said.

Ahart said Mazur is a tremendous leader and athlete who has been with the team since her freshman year. "Each year she's progressed," Ahart said. "She's going to be a quality player in college."

The seniors made nice contributions against the Bees. Mazur had seven kills and a point block, Cahill had four kills, and Maas and Townsend played well offensively and defensively.

Other leaders for the Bucs were Katie Flanagan (2 aces, 16 assists), Jessica Benjamin (2 kills), Cari Reed (2 kills), and Vanessa Sheffield (2 kills, 2 point blocks).

Baldwinsville, however, showed why it is undefeated. The first game was dominated by the middle hitting and defense of Hartman. She had three straight kills to turn a 2-2 game into a 5-2 Bees' lead. There were a few Oswego highlights, such as a couple of powerful spikes by Sheffield, but the Bees maintained the momentum. Galvin set up kills by Colleen Robinson and McVey to make it 20-12, and a Robinson spike inside the back line closed out the game, 25-15.

In game two, Flanagan set up a Cahill spike and later served an ace as the Bucs took an early lead. But the Bees went on an extended run of points to seize command, 17-8. Katie Maher's serving and hitting propelled the visitors. Late in the game, Hartman nailed several kills to help B'ville wrap up a 25-13 win.

Baldwinsville rolled to a 15-8 lead midway through the third game. The Bucs had difficult dealing with Hartman's hitting and defense. Hartman blocked a Mazur spike for a point to make it 20-12. On the match's final point, Robinson set up a decisive kill by McVey.
drum cadence. A series of booms. A tilt to the west.

In less than 18 seconds, the once-proud Sands Casino Hotel fell Thursday night in a mighty cloud of dust, preceded by the sounds of Jersey boys Bruce Springsteen, Frank Sinatra and Jon Bon Jovi and the sights of a dazzling fireworks display.

The spectacle was witnessed by thousands clogging the boardwalk, the beach, even out to sea.

"I used to come to the Sands a lot and my daughter used to work here, so it was a little sad to see the Sands come down," said Fran Carder of Malaga. "It was something like a death."

Donning a Rutgers hat, Gov. Jon S. Corzine called the event an "explosion of opportunity."

The implosion ended once and for all the history of a casino hotel which opened in 1980 as the Brighton.

Nostalgia couldn't save the building. Neither could a request for a last-minute injunction designed to delay the building's demise until assurances were given the demolition would not harm an adjacent hotel.

In the two weeks before the implosion, dynamite was placed inside concrete columns on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 10th and 15th floors of the 21-story hotel tower. After the explosives went off, the tower inclined slightly to the west before gravity pulled the building down.

What would take months to dismantle was completed in less than two weeks and without risk of injury.

The spectacle marked the first casino-hotel implosion in Atlantic City, and the first night implosion in the state.

"The implosion signals the beginning of a very important chapter in Pinnacle's development and in the growth of Atlantic City," said Daniel Lee, CEO of Pinnacle Entertainment Inc., which bought the Sands last November.

Lee promised to out-Vegas Las Vegas while building something that pays tribute to the beach and boardwalk.

"It's time to reinvent the city into a destination that happens to have casinos," he said.

Vincent Barth, who owns the Park Lane Apartment Hotel across the street from the site, sought an injunction claiming Pinnacle had not obtained a clean bill of health to prevent asbestos and other toxins from being released in the air. Superior Court Judge William Nugent denied the injunction Thursday afternoon.

The judge ruled Barth and his attorney, Clifford Van Syoc, did not prove with clear and convincing evidence that there would be "substantial, immediate and irreparable harm" if the implosion went off as scheduled. Nugent said he did not find credible evidence such toxins would be released or even a substantial possibility of that happening.

Van Syoc said the suit ended with the judicial decision.

Pinnacle Atlantic City CEO, Kim Townsend said she expected no less of an outcome.

"We chose the companies we did because of their pedigree," she said.

Townsend said Thursday night was a night to celebrate an uplifting moment.

Still, longtime Sands employees like Audrey Smithouser of Egg Harbor Township witnessed the implosion with mixed feelings.

"The Sands was part of my life. I met my husband there," said Smithouser, who worked at the hotel casino for more than 23 years. She brought her twin daughters, Megan and Lauren, who spent a lot of time in the hotel.

Said Linda Wells, a 22-year employee from Mays Landing, "I spent half my life there. I had a lot of friends."

Bulldozers and other heavy equipment have already knocked down other portions of the Sands. The old customer parking garage will be imploded before the end of the year, while the valet garage will come down by traditional wrecking ball.

Today, demolition crews will begin the arduous work of cleaning up, the next step in a long process to replace the Sands with a $1.5 billion megaresort on par with Borgata Hotel Casino and Spa.

Pinnacle expects to break ground next year on a project which will stretch from the boardwalk across Pacific Avenue when it opens by 2012.

Pinnacle is not yet ready to reveal a design or name, Townsend said.

A painful way to raise money
Fraternity to avoid discipline
About 300 people laugh to comedian
Carmichael brick project yet to begin
Trivia game sign up extends
About 60 students get mentoring experience at ceremony
ROTC competes at Atterbury
Senators focus on student safety
Ball State works to encourage recycling
HOMECOMING: Ashley Awards winners
CAMPUS: Sue Errington to speak at series
FOOTBALL: 'A do or die game'
SOCCER: Leaders of MAC face off Sunday
WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL: Cards to keep pushing
MEN'S TENNIS: Three Cardinals to play at regionals
MAC: Week Eight Preview
WOMEN'S TENNIS: BSU to host fall tourney
CROSS COUNTRY: Sophomore named Runner of the Week
FIELD HOCKEY: Cardinals to play final home game Sunday
Pick your pleasure
OUR VIEW: Missing bricks
BEWILDERED SOCIETY: Beat fall blues with 'college trail'
THE O'KEY FACTOR: Don't waste too much time online
INTERACTIVE: Police map




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Top Story
Muncie Central student defends himself in shoving incident

Published Thursday, October 18, 2007
by Lauren Wong


Controvery is brewing in the halls of Muncie Central High School. A student acknowleges shoving his principal, but claims the principal caused the incident.

"He was reaching for my shirt and stuff ," Darius Townsend explained Wednesday in an interview with NewsLink Indiana. "I told him I had to go take a test, I tried to walk away from him, he bumbed me, I tried to walk away from him again, he bumbed me again, and he did it a third time. Then I almost fell, I was stumbling back, and I pushed him off me. Then they arrested me without asking me, hearing my side of the story."

According to Muncie Police documents the situation stems from Townsend not following the dress code. In his statement to police, Principal Daniel claimed Townsend initiated the incident, stating, "He... took both hands and pushed me."

A security officer for Muncie Central, Joe Brewer, says the incident could have been avoided.

"That incident probably never would've happened. if they would've eliminated the fact of pants being down in the first place," says Brewer.

The incident started in the west hall of Muncie Central where Townsend shoved Principal Daniel. It may have been the third time that Townsend has been in trouble with the school, but he wants to come back to prove he can do better.

"Yes, I do want to go back to school. This won't happen again," says Townsend.

Getting students to follow the rules is not just something principals and teaches have trouble accomplishing, but local law enforcement can find it difficult, too, according to Brewer.

"We can have a police officer turn around and ask a kid to pull their pants up and instead of pulling them up they pull them down, deliberately," says Brewer.

Principal Daniel did not want to comment, citing the advice of his attorney. Townsend's initial hearing is set for October 25.


Send this page to a friend Football

? Middle linebacker Jordan Howard (Lake) tied a Robert Morris single-game record with 20 tackles against Central Connecticut State.

? Kyle Adams (Hoover) rushed for 84 yards in Ohio Wesleyan's 27-10 win over Denison.

? Defensive back Dan Beachy (Lake) finished with seven tackles in Malone's 42-35 win over Walsh.

? Quarterback Billy Cundiff (Green) completed 16-of-25 passes for 247 yards and two touchdowns in Ashland's 47-21 win over Northern Michigan.

Cross country

? John Carroll's Danny DiRuzza (Marlington) finished second in 27:00.95 at the Western Michigan George Dale Invitational.

? Mount Union's Dustin Ford (Perry) was 18th in 25:35 in a preregional meet at Calvin.

? Otterbein's Ashton Shanower (Marlington) was 13th in 19:48 at the Wilmington Fall Classic. Muskingum's Lauren Jackson (St. Thomas Aquinas) was 106th in 22:38.20.

? Kristen LeFever (Marlington) finished 30th in 19:58 to lead Walsh at the Wisconsin-Parkside Lucian Rosa Invitational. Megan Case (Louisville) was 51st in 20:34, Jen Birney (Dover) was 58th in 20:56, Lindsay Cooper (Central Catholic) finished 61st in 21:06 and Jackie Delamater (Hoover) was 62nd in 21:09.

? Mount Union's Aly Myers (Triway) finished 31st in a pre-regional meet at Calvin.

? Marietta's Logan Wern (Hoover) was 80th in 21:32.20 at the Carnegie Mellon Invitational.

Golf

? Malone's Justin Lower (Northwest) finished fifth with a two-day score of 145 and earned All-America honors at the NCCAA national championships. Darren Phipps (Lake) tied for 14th at 152, Quinn Parker (Central Catholic) finished at 161 and Ben Smith (Carrollton) carded a 164.

? Baldwin-Wallace's Matt Lewis (Northwest) was third on the team with a 78.12 stroke average during the fall season. He had a low round of 74 on the second day of the Denison Tournament.

? Molly Scheetz (Perry), Lydia Cole (East Canton), Karli Townsend (Malvern), Shelly McKinney (Malvern) and Nicole Carlone (St. Thomas Aquinas) recently completed the fall season at Baldwin-Wallace. Scheetz led the Yellow Jackets with an 88.0 stroke average, 12th best in school history. Cole averaged a career-low 92.6 with a best round of 83 at the Wilmington Tournament. McKinney averaged a career-best 97.2 with a career-low 95 at Wilmington. Townsend averaged a career-low 98.2 with a career-best 90 at Wilmington. Carlone averaged 129.25 and had a low-round 124 at the Otterbein Tournament.

? Walsh's Kaitlin Sesock (Lake) finished 36th with a round of 103 at the Allegheny Invitational.

Soccer

? Casey Eck (Hoover) scored the go-ahead goal in Walsh's 3-1 win over Urbana.

Tennis

? Hofstra's Alex Hosner (Jackson) reached the semifinals of the Hampton Roads Invitational in singles.

Volleyball

? Francis Marion's Jessica Lombardi (Jackson) was named the Peach Belt Conference's player of the week for the second time in three weeks. Lomabrdi averaged 4.50 kills, 4.58 digs, 0.92 blocks and 0.33 service aces per game in three matches last week. She went into the week leading the league with an average of 3.80 kills.

? Malone's Alyssa Dibell (Fairless) had 55 assists in a five-game win over Concordia and 17 assists in a three-game sweep of West Virginia Tech. Kristen Schoolcraft (McKinley) also had seven kills and seven blocks against Concordia.

? Annie Schultheis (GlenOak) had 11 kills and 17 digs in Allegheny's win over Pitt-Greensburg. She also had 21 kills against Denison.

? Amanda Beyersdorff (Jackson) had 38 kills, a .333 attack percentage and 12 blocks in Hofstra's three matches last week.
Monday was the toughest of days for Lauren Townsend's friends and family.

But the life Lauren lived helped them get through it.

"The very essence of Lauren lives on, and with us," the Rev. Bill Selby said Monday as more than 1,000 people said goodbye to the radiant 18-year-old Columbine High School senior who died in the violence last week.

Even though her friends and family hugged and wept, they also celebrated a life they said was about love, laughter and light.

"People say that Lauren was a victim," said her brother Matt, 25. "I don't think of her in that way. The ugly thing that happened last Tuesday, they couldn't conquer her beauty."

Lauren's coffin Monday was covered with flowers and messages of love and hope, the feelings her friends say she inspired in them.

Through a video prepared by another older brother, Josh, images of Lauren and her life filled Foothills Bible Church -- dancing, laughing, learning to walk, hugging a whale at Sea World -- pictures of a life full of energy and promise.

Lauren was headed to Colorado State University. She wanted to be a wildlife biologist, but that was just one of her dreams.

"She was a marvelous sketch artist," Selby said. "She had sketched her own wedding dress -- one for summer and one for winter, just in case."

And she was a scream, always joking, playing tricks and fooling around with her pals.

"I remember her always laughing," Angela King said. "She made me laugh so hard."

They laughed Monday, recalling how Lauren would scrape a big spoonful of icing from a cake and gulp it down, or how, with that solar smile, she could melt anyone who was mad at her.

Lauren was the complete package, they said. So athletic, she was captain of the volleyball team. So smart, she was a member of the National Honor Society. So talented, teachers used her to sketch three-dimensional illustrations on chalkboards.

And just a joy to be around.

"I don't think we should be sad," friend Rachel Danford said. "We should be happy we knew her."

She was the kind of teen-ager kids loved to have as a baby sitter, a trait that wasn't lost on Lauren's math teacher, Lori McMullen, who had her baby-sit her kids.

Lauren inevitably showed up with a backpack full of movies for the kids to watch, and they would make forts from chairs and blankets to play in. Not long ago, Lauren brought McMullen's children stuffed animals, little lambs that McMullen said her kids have been clutching to help them cope with the tragedy.

"Lauren was one of those rare gems," McMullen said.

No matter how eloquent, no one at Monday's service could adequately convey what a bright, warm and caring presence Lauren was in people's lives, teacher Tom Tonelli said.

"There's not a speaker, poet or singer who could express how beautiful Lauren is," he said.

And while there was beauty on the outside, Lauren also was an intellectual force, with interests that ranged from Shakespeare to science and beyond.

"How many people have never gotten a 'B'?" Tonelli said.

Despite the violence that took so many lives last week, Tonelli told Lauren's friends not to doubt the existence of God, or love.

"She was proof of God's love," he said. "I long to see that awesome smile again."

Her brother, Josh, laughed about the good times they had together, the silly videos they made about their dog, and their "action thriller" video that had the fate of civilization hanging on their ability to make a sandwich in the family kitchen.

"I love my sister," he said. "Not only that, I like my sister."

There is one thing mourners can do to honor Lauren, Selby said -- "make gentle our bruised world." He suggested that schools form "Lauren Groups," in which people talk about their lives and how they are alike, not different.

"May Lauren Groups spring up all over the world," he said.

Indeed, in her short life, Lauren brought together people from different backgrounds.

Lauren had an extended family, with stepbrothers and stepsisters. And Lauren was the glue that bound them together, stepsister Kathy Johnson said.

"She was the best little sister in the whole world, an angel on Earth. I know she's looking down us now," she said.

The dead. So much pain is brought by their deaths. Friends, family, loved ones and acquaintances mourn the loss of these bright smiles and the personalities behind them. Even those of us who never knew them shed our tears for them. Everywhere people are impacted by this sad, sad tragedy - worldwide.

Never again will mothers and fathers hug these daughters and sons, nor will grandchildren hug granddad goodnight. Never again will a sweet smile or the words 'I love you' be shared by these thirteen people. All that's left are memories, photos... and tears. CBS/AP) A sign in front of Columbine High School sets the tone for the fifth anniversary of the worst school shooting in U.S. history: "A Time to Remember, A Time to Hope."

The Early Show correspondent Hattie Kauffman, reports that a park adjacent to the school, where on April 20, 1999, students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold gunned down 12 students and one teacher, will be the site of a ceremony and a candlelight vigil Tuesday night.

For the families of the victims, five years later, the grief remains strong, but so does the anger, the feeling that some, if not all, of the deaths could have been prevented.

Kelly Fleming's mother says, "April 20th should never have happened. There were too, too many signs along the way that were missed."

Some parents who buried children killed at Columbine High haven't forgiven the authorities, who they say failed to stop Harris and Klebold.

On April 20, 1999, the two boys entered the school with an arsenal of weaponry and had planned even more devastation that was foiled when their bombs failed to ignite. In addition to the 12 deaths, many more were injured.

Onre of the dead was Lauren Townsend. "We're at peace with where Lauren is," her mother, Dawn Anna, says. "I am at peace with that. But I am not at peace with how she got there."

The police response that day still provokes outrage. As students poured out of the school, police did not move in. Teacher Patti Nielson made a frantic 911 call.

Here is her conversation with the police dispatcher:
Nielson: "He turned the gun straight at us and shot. And my God, the window went out. And the kid standing there with us, I think, I, he got hit."

Dispatcher: "Ok, OK. We've got help on the way, madam."

Lauren Townsend's step-father, Bruce Beck asks, "Why did the 911 operator tell Patty Nielson to keep the kids down, help is on the way, when they knew they weren't going to send any policemen into the building?"

Both Kelly Fleming and Lauren Townsend were killed in the library, where students had fled to hide under the desks.

Dawn Anna says, "Our Lauren was told the police were coming."

Dee Fleming says, "You know. while Kelly was hiding in the library, waiting for help, nobody was coming. You know, you just storm the place, you don't stand back."

Three hours went by before police entered the school. Even as a wounded student came to a window to be dragged out, the SWAT teams were held back. Inside, teacher Dave Sanders lay dying in a classroom.

Bruce Beck says, "It's unconscionable to us that Dave was left on that floor to die."

Jefferson County district attorney, Dave Thomas had to tell the parents, five years ago their children had been killed. Asked why law enforcement didn't go into the building, he says, "Well, law enforcement has gone back and they've looked at the way in which the response was handled here at Columbine. And they've made a lot of changes. And I think most of those changes are for the better. And I think all of us, whether we're law enforcement or the school districts or parents, have gone back and reflected on this incident and tried to see what changes we could make to make sure this doesn't happen again."

In another controversy, authorities have admitted numerous complaints were made against Harris and Klebold before the attack. They were never followed up.

Kelly Fleming's father, Don Fleming, says, "You know they had 15 contacts with law enforcement over the previous two years. They were in trouble with the school. They were constantly in trouble with their parents."

Families of the victims say the warning signs were clear: Misplaced police reports, prophetic videos made by the killers at the school itself, a father's secret journal, a Web site and an essay promising death.

"How many times have we heard this was everything, only for something else to come out?" asks Dawn Anna. "The first time we heard that was back in 1999."

Some 30,000 documents in the case have been released over the years. Another 40,418 pieces of evidence, ranging from a tooth fragment to propane tanks, were put on public display earlier this year.

Local authorities, the school district, a state commission and the Colorado attorney general have all investigated, but the question remains: Why didn't someone - a parent, a sheriff's deputy, a teacher, a fellow student - step in before the suicidal gunmen went on their rampage?

Many red flags, Don Fleming says, were missed.

Victims' families have tried to get answers: Some sued the sheriff's department, the school district and the parents of the killers. They won damages, but a federal judge sealed many records.

At the heart of most questions is the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office, which responded to the massacre and led the official investigation. Its track record is spotty at best.

After the shootings, sheriff's officials downplayed tips about Harris making death threats - even though they relied on them to get a search warrant for his home hours after the bloodshed.

Randy and Judy Brown, whose sons were threatened by Harris, made several attempts to get the sheriff's department to investigate.

The tips started in 1997, when one of the Browns' two sons gave a deputy a printout of a Web site on which Harris boasted of going on nighttime missions with Klebold, firing weapons and vandalizing property.

The Web site later included boasts by Harris and Klebold about
building pipe bombs and referred to "ground zero."

The tip was forwarded to investigator John Hicks, no longer with the force. A warrant was drafted to search the Harris home, but it was never executed. A report by Hicks was found tucked inside a training manual just six months ago, a stunning revelation that prompted new Sheriff Ted Mink to ask Colorado Attorney General Ken Salazar to investigate.

Salazar said he found no negligence by the sheriff's department, though he found at least 15 instances of contact between law enforcement and one or both of the killers.

Other warning signs included violent videos made by Harris and Klebold for a class project and an essay by Klebold in another class describing a Columbine-like slaying of "preps." In one video project five months before the rampage, the two stalk through Columbine itself, offering hit-man services to classmates tired of being bullied.

Harris and Klebold were arrested for a break-in a year before the attack, but parole officers were never told about the death threats tied to the teens. Both completed probation and were deemed to be likely candidates for success as adults.

"There was overwhelming evidence. Columbine should have been prevented," said Brian Rohrbough, whose son, Daniel, was one of the first to die. "We cannot turn back the hands of time, but we can put all this information out on the table. ... We can make this an example of what went wrong so that we can prevent it from happening again."

Most excruciating for some of those seeking answers is the fact that some information is being kept secret. The Harris and Klebold families were forced to give depositions to settle a lawsuit, but what they said remains sealed.

Joe Kechter, whose son, Matt, died at Columbine, said the lawsuit was settled because families were running out of money to fight the insurance companies whose homeowners' policies covered the Klebolds and Harrises.

"I hope some day the Klebolds and Harrises agree to get this information out so it can save other kids' lives in the future," Kechter said. "I am doing this in respect of my son. I feel the police and the whole system let him down that day. I am not going to let him down."

The school district's investigation also remains confidential because officials say its release would violate attorney-client privilege. Salazar's investigation remains open, though family members don't expect big news from the new U.S. Senate candidate.

"I really don't think we are going to get any more answers," said Al Velasquez, whose son, Kyle, was among those killed.

But the horror of Columbine may have improved school safety nationwide. Surveillance cameras, metal detectors, and I.D. badges are now common in schools. Most of all, the tragedy raised vigilance, and other deadly plots have been averted. Near Los Angeles last year, classmates reported two students who were making threats. There was a detailed journal, which included references to inflicting harm upon the faculty and other students at the high school.

In Spokane, a Columbine tragedy was averted when police evacuated the school within minutes of a shooter entering.

And in Northern California, an alert teen prevented a massacre at a local college. Police uncovered weapons and a Web site worshipping the Columbine killers - red flags that, today, no one is ignoring.

Dawn Anna says, "There is no excuse for a child to go to a school library on a school day. and not make it out alive."

Dawn Anna will be among the memorial speakers along with victim Anne Marie Hochhalter, who remains paralyzed from wounds inflicted by the killers.

The students who were enrolled at Columbine then are long gone; the 1998-99 freshmen class graduated two years ago. But now among the students are brothers and students of those wounded in the attack.

The only administrator left is Principal Frank DeAngelis, who said
staying at Columbine helped keep him sane.

He tells The Early Show co-anchor Harry Smith, "I refer to what Klebold and Harris did that day as an act of terrorism. That's part of the reason I was back at Columbine High School. I was not going to let them win.

"People ask me when is going to be that magical day that everything is back to normal at Columbine. And I say that day will never come, it will never exist, because what happened on April 20, 1999, will remain with us forever. We will never be back to normal. We just learn to cope and heal and build upon the strength of one another."

None of the 1,700 students of Columbine will be in class Tuesday, since the campus is always closed on the anniversary of the attack. Rick Kaufman, spokesman for the school district, said security was stepped up for Monday's classes.


?MMIV, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.




April 27, 1999