Columbine Report To Be Released

Monday, May 15th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

LITTLETON, Colo. (AP) â€” In the 13 months since the shooting at Columbine High School, the sheriff's office has conducted 4,500 witness interviews and gathered 10,000 pieces of evidence.

Now investigators promise a detailed, minute-by-minute account of what happened after teen-age gunmen Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold began their shooting rampage.

The long-awaited report, parts of which have already been leaked through the media, was to be released today under a deadline set by a judge hearing some of the 15 lawsuits filed by victims and relatives of those killed.

``I saw the draft report in April and there was nothing new in it. My overall sense was that everything in it had already been reported,'' said Jim Cederberg, who represents partially paralyzed shooting victim Richard Castaldo. ``Everybody is going to go over it very closely.''

The two gunmen shot and killed 12 students and one teacher April 20, 1999, before killing themselves.

A Jefferson County district judge ordered the sheriff's office to hand over the report to the families suing Sheriff John Stone and his investigators.

The families' lawsuits claim Stone's office ignored warnings that Harris and Klebold planned a terrorist act, and that SWAT teams took too long to enter the school after the attack began.

Some parents also are mounting a campaign to recall Stone, accusing him of denying them access to investigation information in order to stall their lawsuits, which had to be filed within one year of the attack.

Sheriff's spokesman Steve Davis has said there will be no comment on the report until it is released. The report, which includes audio and photo clips, is on CD-ROM.

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On the Net: http://jeffcosheriff.com