Attack plan on school server

Harris added files day before killings

Jeff Kass And Kevin Vaughan, Rocky Mountain News

Published July 8, 2006 at midnight

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One of the Columbine killers apparently downloaded plans for a spree of violence into a school computer the day before the shootings, possibly a final act of defiance that might have derailed the massacre if someone had checked the files.

At least 18 pages found in Eric Harris' school computer files are dated April 19, 1999, about 8:30 a.m. Among the clearest indicators of the rampage that he and Dylan Klebold carried out the next day is a sort of crude list that mentions, "prepare explosives" and "shells." Another sheet carries the notations "cannon fuse" and "napalm tests." Drawings of battle gear and what appear to be a swastika are on other pages.

"Had myself or anyone in a position of authority seen these, there would have been a definite confrontation, immediately," Richard Long, former head of technology for Columbine High School, said Friday. "We would have certainly talked to those individuals."

But such a scenario was unlikely. The school did not routinely check student computer files partly because it would take so long, Long said. Such files were accessed by authorities only in response to suspicious activity.

Long, who retired from the school district one year after Columbine, did not know the Jefferson County Schools current policy, and a district representative could not be reached for comment late Friday.

But Brian Rohrbough, whose son Dan was killed at Columbine, questioned whether a computer check might have halted the killings.

Rohrbough said the school was dismissive of other signs that Harris and Klebold were troublesome. They had earlier been busted for hacking into the school computer, and Rohrbough believes the school was informed the two had possibly been making making pipe bombs.

"There's absolutely no reason in my mind to think if (school officials) had seen this stuff they would have given it any more concern than they had given any of these other huge, red flags they had seen over the previous year," Rohrbough said.

The computer documents were made public Thursday as part of nearly 1,000 pages on the two killers and their families released by the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office after a protracted open records fight.

Twelve pages came from Klebold's school computer file, according to the sheriff's department. They include pictures of assault weapons. Unlike the Harris pages, Klebold's do not carry download dates, something Long couldn't explain.

The sheriff's office did not provide an explanation when asked about that discrepancy Friday.

Among the other pages in Harris' file are drawings that include demonic figures and battle scenes.

The sheriff's office apparently copied the pages from the school server, a centralized computer that holds various information, as part of the investigation.

At the time of the Columbine slayings, each student was allotted two megabytes, or space for about 100 pages, on the server, according to Long. Each student accessed their space, or what was called their "home drive" with a password.

The server could only be accessed from a school computer within Columbine, Long added.

Long was familiar with the history of the documents. He recalled being escorted by a sheriff's deputy into the school about a week after the April 20, 1999, shootings.

Classrooms were closed to students at Columbine and access restricted after Harris and Klebold killed 13 others before taking their own lives.

Officers took the whole server - essentially a computer with about four fans to keep it cool - Long said. By the next school year, Columbine had the server back.

Long said he noticed the hard drive was intact, and that the Harris and Klebold documents were still there. Long said those files were deleted after getting the necessary approvals.

Long was also familiar with Harris and Klebold. They were his student assistants for their first two and a half years at Columbine before they got busted for hacking into the computer system and stealing locker combinations.

Long saw the two boys change from "bright-eyed" freshmen to teens with darker attitudes. He believes that downloading the material the day before the shootings - if that is indeed what happened - may have been one way of thumbing their noses at authority.

"They carried propane bottles into the school," he added. "How much more bold can you be?"

Both Long and local police psychologist John Nicoletti, who has studied Columbine, noted that student material is more closely scrutinized in the post-Columbine world. Nicoletti also said that there might be two reasons to download material onto the school servers.

"One hypothesis is the school server is just a little more convenient for them," he said. "The other is it's their way of letting the school know we can get away with it."

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