what do you find sick about it....
i found it sick to watch the footage of the cops during the columbine massacre huddling down and hiding behind shields, unwilling to storm the building while one by one students were being executed...i also found it sickening that search warrant that was not followed up.....and here we have 32 dead under similar circumstances....warnings unheeded, students left to fend for themselves while the keystone kops follow up a bogus lead, giving 2 hours for a homicidal maniac to perfect and execute his evil deed, (video included!)
...this article says the old rules no longer apply....
apparently they do
findarticles.com
Columbine revealed fatal flaw, report says/Police procedures changed
Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), May 18, 2001 by Barry Bortnick
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DENVER - Columbine killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold exposed a fatal flaw in police strategy as they massacred 12 students and a teacher, then killed themselves two years ago.
That conclusion was one of many reached by the Columbine Review Commission, whose 14 members sifted through 15,000 documents and absorbed 1,000 hours of testimony during a yearlong review of the worst school shooting in American history.
The commission, formed at the direction of Gov. Bill Owens, began its work in January 2000 to learn from the attack and recommend ways to prevent future tragedies.
The 175-page report released Thursday determined the school shooting had "broken the mold" police officers had followed for 40 years.
For years, police in Colorado and across the nation were trained to contain, not confront, hostage takers. Such was the case at Columbine when the first officer on the scene exchanged shots with Harris but retreated and waited for SWAT members to arrive rather than pursue the gunman inside the school.
Those rules no longer apply.
"The first duty of the responders should be to stop the assault," said William Erickson, a former Colorado Supreme Court justice and chairman of the commission. "(At Columbine) no efforts were made in that regard."
In addition to its call for a rapid police response, the report urged schools to create teams to evaluate potential threats. The commission also recommended that school officials break through the code of silence that often prevents students from coming forward with news about dangerous classmates.
The commission advised school districts to establish a mechanism like an anonymous telephone line so students could report concerns without repudiation.
"The most disturbing aspect of the tragedy was the fact that many people had pieces of the information about Harris and Klebold, but that information was never acted upon," the commission found.
Harris, for example, created a Web page in 1998 that hinted at his deadly quest. He posted a threat to fellow student Brooks Brown on the site.
Brown's parents alerted Jefferson County authorities, but a search warrant was never completed.
"If the search warrant that was originally proposed had been issued, this probably wouldn't have occurred," Erickson said.
Owens agreed improvements are needed. "With the benefit of hindsight, it's clear that the police response needs improvement," he said Thursday at the Capitol. "I'm not sure what else we need to know. We know the sheriff dropped the ball in the pre-tragedy investigation.
"It's really going to be up to the schools and the law enforcement authorities in terms of how quickly they choose to address these recommendations," Owens said.
While schools were urged to focus on prevention, police were advised to look at training and response. The commission recommended that police train all officers - not just SWAT members - to react quickly in a crisis.
Boulder County Sheriff and commission member George Epp revamped his policies in light of Columbine. Still, Epp refused to criticize the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department for the way it handled the crisis.
"Their response was what you would have expected from many law enforcement agencies at the time," he said.
The commission was not as kind to the Sheriff's Department and Sheriff John Stone. "Sheriff Stone was concerned about threats to his officers," Erickson said. "There had to be a balance, and the sheriff chose a perimeter control. But look who suffered."
Stone declined to respond. |
