Columbine families polled on records

Jeffco sheriff seeks input on potential release of writings, 'basement tapes'

Kevin Vaughan, Rocky Mountain News

Published February 9, 2006 at midnight

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Jefferson County Sheriff Ted Mink is polling the families of those killed and injured at Columbine as he decides whether to release videotapes and writings left behind by killers Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris.

Mink is sending a letter to the families of a dozen students and a teacher who died in the April 20, 1999, attack and to the families of those who were injured that day.

The letter will ask the families for their thoughts on the potential release of the material - including the now-infamous "basement tapes" - and their thoughts on how the release should be handled if the tapes and writings are made public.

All of the material was taken from the Klebold and Harris homes under search warrants after the shootings.

The Colorado Supreme Court ruled Nov. 15 that the material is subject to state open records law and directed Mink to determine whether it should be made public.

The material includes videotapes that Harris and Klebold made in the months before the attack at Columbine High School.Often referred to as the "basement tapes" because they were recorded on the lower level of Harris' home, they show the two planning the attack.

A journal kept by Harris' father - it details law enforcement contacts with the family before the shootings - is also among the items that Mink must decide whether to release.

Opinions vary among the families.

"My feeling is that all of this information needs to be released," said Brian Rohrbough, whose son, Dan, died on a sidewalk outside the school.

"There's been a long battle. It should have been released years ago."

Rohrbough, a longtime critic of the sheriff's office, said he believes that the only reason the tapes and writings have been withheld is because they reflect negatively on the department.

The sheriff's office had been given information about the killers more than a year before the attacks, and a detective had drafted an affidavit for a search warrant for Harris' home.

It was never taken to a judge or executed.

That document was withheld from the public for two years and was, according to a grand jury, apparently the subject of an elaborate cover-up involving a former sheriff's official.

Releasing the material, Rohrbough said, will help people understand more about the killers and the warning signs that were missed.

"I think it sheds a lot of light on what was going on in the year leading up to the attack," he said. "I think it tells a lot about the two households. And I think it's absolutely necessary."

Dale Todd, whose son, Evan, was wounded in the school library, also said the material "most definitely" should be released.

"I've been wanting it public from the day I saw it," he said.

"The behavior experts need to be studying that. . . . I think if they go public, people will watch them and go, 'Oh, my God, that could be our kid.' "

Less certain is Connie Michalik, whose son, Richard Castaldo, was wounded in the first flurry of gunfire outside the school and is now paralyzed.

"I'm not sure how I feel about it," she said.

"I asked Richard how he felt about it, and he's not sure how he feels about it, either."

She said she can see reasons to make the material public.

But she said she also can see some reasons not to, such as feeding morbid curiosity, rather than serving as a tool to learn how to prevent future violence.

"If it's just so people can go, 'Oh wow, what a shame, how terrible' - what's the point of that?" she said. "You really get into some gray areas."

Mink declined to be interviewed for this story.

Sheriff's spokeswoman Jacki Kelley said that Mink would discuss the decision-making process once he decides what to do.

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