Columbine tape released to public
■ Columbine victims9
families are livid over
decision to sell video.
DENVER (AP) - The families of
Columbine High School shooting vic
tims who fought for access to video
taken during the massacre are out
raged that authorities also are releas
ing a tape to the public - with a music
soundtrack.
“This shows no regard whatsoever
for the feelings of the victims,” said
James Rouse, a lawyer for the fami
lies, after learning of the Jefferson
County Sheriff’s Department decision
on Tuesday.
The videotape - a Littleton Fire
Department training tape that
includes 25 to 30 minutes of footage
from surveillance cameras in the
school cafeteria, was to be made avail
able to the public starting this after
noon for a $25 fee. The package also
includes two to three hours of news
helicopter footage.
Sheriff’s Department spokesman
Steve Davis said he could not com
ment on the decision to release the
videotapes because it involves the
families’ lawsuit. A spokeswoman for
the County Attorney’s office did not
immediately return a call for com
ment Wednesday.
Rouse said part of the training
tape is set to a pop-music soundtrack.
One of the songs, “If It Were Up
To Me” by Cheryl Wheeler, includes
the lines “Maybe it’s the movies,
maybe it’s the books/ Maybe it’s the
bullets, maybe it’s the real crooks/
Maybe it’s the drugs, maybe it’s the
parents,” and concludes: “Maybe it’s
the end, but I know one thing/ If it
were up to me, I’d take away the guns.”
None of the surveillance camera
tape shows students getting shot,
Rouse said. But he said the cafeteria
tape does show students scattering as
the gunmen detonate a bomb and
begin shooting.
In addition to the cafeteria scenes,
the training tape includes footage
taken later in the school library, where
two seniors killed 10 of their 13 vic
tims and themselves on April 20,
1999. The bodies were removed
before the later footage was made, but
there was still blood on the carpet and
police tape showing bodies’ locations,
Rouse said.
The parents are “absolutely out
raged and horrified. Each one of those
pools of blood is where someone’s
child died or was seriously wounded,”
Rouse said today.
He also complained about the tel
evision news footage shot from a
KCNC-TV helicopter. “It does show
dead and wounded kids on the ground
and rescue workers pulling the dead
and wounded kids by their legs,”
Rouse said.
The Jefferson County Sheriff’s
office was ordered Monday to turn the
tapes over to six families who wanted
the footage to support their claims that
officers mishandled the shootings.
They did so on Tuesday.
County Attorney Frank Hutfless
then surprised the families by
announcing that copies of the tapes
also would be made available to the
public.
“We really have less than 24 hours
for the victims’ families to review it
and get over the shock,” Rouse said
Tuesday.
Phyllis Velasquez, whose son Kyle
was killed at Columbine, wasn’t sur
prised by the decision to release the
tape.
“This is just how it’s been for the
past year. This is life on a daily basis
for us, waiting to see what’s next,” she
told KUSA-TV
Littleton Fire Department offi
cials have shown the training tape
U The parents are
“are absolutely
outraged and
horrified. Each
one of those
pools of blood is
where someone s
child died or
was seriousely
wounded.”
James Rouse
attorney for victim’s families
about 50 times at presentations across
the country, including an International
Association of Fire Chiefs meeting in
Kansas City, Kan., last May, city
spokeswoman Kelli Narde told the
Rocky Mountain News.
“They’ve been everywhere,” she
said. “They’ve been from coast-to
coast and back again.”
Russian security negotiations continue
WASHINGTON (AP)r Russian
Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov on
Wednesday launched a new round of
security negotiations with the
Clinton administration. He pledged
cooperation despite deep differences
- over anti-missile defenses.
Hedging his bets, Ivanov also
met with probable Republican presi
dential nominee George W. Bush,
outlining Russia’s foreign policy
goals and its objections to undermin
ing a 28-year-old landmark arms
control treaty.
“We want our relations not to be
dependent on the direction of the
political situation,” Ivanov said.
The foreign minister’s three-day
visit is designed to prepare for a
smooth summit meeting in Moscow
on June 4-5 between President
Clinton and Russian President
Vladimir Putin.
Ivanov struck a conciliatory
stance even while objecting to a lim
ited missile defense system that
Clinton is contemplating and a far
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reaching national defense backed by
Bush and other conservative
Republicans.
The Clinton administration says
America needs the system to defend
against a missile threat from such
countries as North Korea and Iran.
“If there are any threats and if
those threats are realistic, then let us
work together,” Ivanov said.
He said negotiations on new
security arrangements started
Wednesday at his lengthy meeting
with Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright, which military experts
attended, and continued later at the
Pentagon.
Among the Russian goals are
limiting the long-range nuclear war
heads in U.S. and Russian arsenals to
1,500, Ivanov said.
Last week, U.S. and Russian
negotiators opened talks in Geneva,
Switzerland, on a treaty that would
impose ceilings of 2,000 to 2,500.
“We believe that it is important
and it is our task to, in maximum
detail, present our arguments and our
it If there are any
threats and if
those threats are
realistic, then let
us work together.”
Igor Ivanov
Russian foreign minister
concerns to the partners, listen to
their position and then elaborate on a
joint decision,” Ivanov said in
Russian.
“It would be too premature to
speak of the concrete outcome of
those negotiations yet,” he said. “But
I would like to tell you that we are
holding a sincere, constructive dia
logue on the whole variety of issues.”
Meanwhile, Bush said that it was
time to “redefine” U.S.-Russian rela
tions. Aides said Bush told Ivanov: “I
don't view you as the enemy, and you
shouldn’t view us as the enemy.
I
That’s the old way of thinking.”
On Capitol Hill, Sen. Jesse
Helms, R-N.C., pledged to block any
arms-control agreement that Clinton
might negotiate with Russia in the
closing months of his term.
Helms, who chairs the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee, said
he was fearful Clinton wanted to
conclude an arms-reduction agree
ment with Moscow as part of his
legacy as president.
“In a few months the American
people will go to the polls to elect a
new president - a president who
must have a clean break from the
failed policies of this administra
tion,” Helms said. “He must have the
freedom and the flexibility to estab
lish his own security policies.”
Ivanov also vigorously defended
Moscow’s attempt to suppress a
rebellion in the republic of
Chechnya. Along with persistent
U.S. criticism, the top U.N. human
rights body this week accused Russia
of widespread violations including
indiscriminate use of force.
Scattered showers
high 67, low 49
Partly cloudy
high 66, low 47
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Scouts’ case argued
before Supreme Court
WASHINGTON (AP) - Supreme
Court justices struggled Wednesday
over whether to let the Boy Scouts bar
homosexuals from serving as troop
leaders, role models in an organiza
tion that teaches its members to be
“morally straight.”
Without saying how they will
ultimately vote, several justices
voiced skepticism about how far the
court could go to force open admis
sions upon private organizations.
“In your view, a Catholic organi
zation has to admit Jews” and “a
Jewish organization has to admit
Catholics,” Justice Stephen G. Breyer
told Evan Wolfson, the lawyer for
James Dale of New Jersey, a former
assistant scoutmaster ousted when
the organization learned he was gay.
Dale subsequently filed suit against
the Scouts.
Justices Sandra Day O’Connor
the Scouts could be required to admit
girls.
Justice Antonin Scalia voiced his
reservations another way.
“They think that homosexuality is
immoral,” he said, asking why the
Scouts must accept as a leader
“someone who embodies a contra
diction of their message?”
Founded in 1910, the Scouts have
an oath and law that long have
required members to promise to be
“clean” and “morally straight.” But
no written rule specifically addresses
homosexuality.
Wolfson said the Scouts are not
primarily an “anti-gay organization,”
and therefore Dale’s presence did not
burden the group’s message.
Dale did not seek to use his lead
ership position to advocate homosex
uality, Wolfson added. New Jersey’s
highest court ruled that the Boy
! leaders, vio
■ Veimont
Governor signs ‘civil union’
bill into law without fanfare
MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) - Gov.
Howard Dean signed a first-in-the
nation law Wednesday granting gay
couples nearly all of the benefits of
marriage.
“I think it is a courageous and
powerful statement about who we are
in the state ofVermont,” the Democrat
said. “I also believe that this legisla
tion speaks to the heart of this state,
and certainly to my heart.”
The legislation creating marriage
like “civil unions” reached the gover
nor’s desk shortly before lunch time,
just a day after the House gave its final
approval. And by the time of a 2 p.m.
news conference, he had already
signed it out of view of TV cameras,
photographers and reporters.
■ Brazil
Catholic Church apologizes
to Brazil’s Indians, blacks
PORTO SEGURO, Brazil (AP) -
The Catholic Church apologized
Wednesday to Brazil’s Indians and
blacks for die “sins and errors” com
mitted by its clergy and faithful over
the past 500 years. Indians were reluc
tant to forgive.
The apology preceded a special
Mass held on the beach where
Franciscan Friar Henrique de
Coimbra celebrated Brazil’s first
Mass on April 26, 1500, four days
after the Portuguese expedition made
landfall.
Organizers said some 15,000 peo
ple, including more than 300 bishops,
attended the Mass under a steady driz
zle in Coroa Vermelha, just outside
this seaside resort in the northeastern
state of Bahia. Italian Cardinal Angelo
Sodano represented Pope John Paul II.
■ Texas
Five-hour prison fight kills
one inmate, injures five others
LAMESA, Texas (AP) - Racial
tensions fueled fights between 300
black and Hispanic inmates at a West
Texas prison that left one inmate dead
and five others in intensive care,
authorities said.
Some prisoners wielded garden
tools in the five-hour melee Tuesday
night at the minimum- to medium
security Smith Unit, which remained
under lock-down Wednesday.
“We believe it was very racially
motivated,” said Larry Todd, a Texas
Department of Criminal Justice
spokesman.
The fights began after a Hispanic
inmate confronted a black inmate who
was fondling himself in front of a
female officer in a dining hall, said
Larry Fitzgerald, also a Department of
Criminal Justice spokesman.
■ Ukraine
Ukrainians remember 1986
nuclear power plant disaster
KIEV, Ukraine (AP) - In public
gatherings, official statements and tel
evised reports, Ukrainians on
Wednesday marked the Chernobyl
nuclear disaster with a degree of open
ness that contrasted sharply with the
secrecy that once surrounded it.
When a reactor at the Chernobyl
nuclear power plant exploded and
caught fire April 26, 1986, in the
world’s worst nuclear accident, it was
at first a nearly invisible tragedy.
Soviet authorities tried to keep the
accident under wraps, and its deadly
consequences - radiation - could not
be seen with the eye.
But the aftereffects are grimly vis
ible: an estimated 4,000 deaths among
those who took part in the hasty and
pporly paganized cleanup; 70,000