El Paso County sheriff will lead review at request of Jeffco's Stone
By Kevin Vaughan, News Staff Writer
Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone on Friday sought an independent review of new allegations that a Denver police officer fired the bullet that killed a Columbine High student.
El Paso County Sheriff John Anderson agreed to Stone's request.
"They are still working out the scope of it," said El Paso County sheriff's Lt. Melissa Hartman.
It wasn't clear whether Anderson would have the power to conduct new interviews or order new laboratory tests.
Jefferson County sheriff's spokeswoman Jacki Tallman said Anderson could decide what needed to be done.
This is the first time the sheriff's department has asked an agency not involved in the case to investigate any aspect of the April 1999 shootings. El Paso was selected because it's a large department with ample resources.
The parents of Daniel Rohrbough, a 15-year-old Columbine student who was shot outside the school, alleged in a lawsuit filed in 2000 that a bullet from a law officer -- not from murderers Eric Harris or Dylan Klebold -- caused their son's fatal wound.
But it wasn't until Wednesday that Rohrbough's parents, in appealing a federal judge's decision to dismiss their suit, named Denver police Sgt. Dan O'Shea as the officer they believe fired the shot.
O'Shea has not returned messages left by the Rocky Mountain News. However, 9 News reported Friday night that he denied he shot Rohrbough.
Rohrbough's family introduced a sworn statement from a woman who said that she spoke with O'Shea two days after the Columbine tragedy and that he was emotionally devastated and told her that he feared he had shot a student in the confusion.
As supporting evidence, the family said in court papers that two law officers had provided them with information that contradicts the official version of events. One, identified as Arapahoe County sheriff's Deputy Jim Taylor, told the family that he heard submachine gun fire and then saw a boy, later identified as Daniel Rohrbough, shot as he was running. Taylor is out of town and could not be reached for comment. A second officer, identified in court papers as Jefferson County sheriff's Deputy Annette Walker, told Rohrbough's mother she saw the boy holding a door open for escaping students. If true, that would undermine the contention of the sheriff's office that Rohrbough was gunned down in the first few flurries of gunfire from Harris and Klebold. Walker could not be reached for comment. "Those are serious allegations," Tallman said. "I know that in an effort to avoid any controversy, Sheriff Stone thought this would be the best way to handle this." Brian Rohrbough, the father of the slain student and a persistent critic of Stone's, said he would reserve judgment on Anderson's review. "This is just one more self-serving attempt of John Stone's to say he did everything right," Rohrbough said. "The fact that they are only going to look at the stuff around Daniel, and not look in the library . . . indicates they are certainly not looking for the truth." The only way to get at the truth, he said, is to question witnesses under oath. "If they look at the evidence I have available right now, they will not be able to come to any other conclusion than O'Shea having shot and killed my son. This should be released publicly." Rohrbough and other Columbine families have waged a long, public battle with Stone's office over key issues in the case and the release of documents and evidence. They also have pointed to the official sheriff's report and raised questions about some of the assertions there. For example, the official report, issued in May 2000, said that Rohrbough was one of the first few students injured, and that Klebold then "goes back down the stairs to the area outside the cafeteria and shoots Daniel Rohrbough again at close range." However, earlier this year, the families obtained numerous documents about the ballistics evidence. The documents stated that the only bullet found in Rohrbough's body was "consistent" with a gun that Harris -- not Klebold -- carried. And the bullet that caused the fatal wound had passed through his body and was not identified. Contact Kevin Vaughan at (303) 892-5019 or vaughank@RockyMountainNews.com.
Just wanted to be the first to get that on the record. Anyone who criticized the LA County Sherriff's office over the Beck conflagration was automatically branded a cop-hater by people like t-shirt. This one shouldn't be any different.