Attorneys involved in discussions about whether to disclose a draft affidavit to search Eric Harris’ home should not be disciplined for those conversations, according to a state report, which went on to criticize the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office’s handling of the incident.
Columbine parents Randy and Judy Brown, who reported concerns about shooter Eric Harris more than a year before the April 1999 tragedy, filed a complaint in December with John Gleason, the Supreme Court’s attorney regulation counsel, seeking to disbar the attorneys because they didn’t disclose materials discussed at the meeting that could have been used by Columbine families as evidence in lawsuits.
“Much of the conduct complained of in this investigation is appropriate conduct for an attorney,” wrote Gleason in a response, dated April 13, to the Browns’ complaint. “This evidence causes one to ask more questions about the conduct of the sheriff’s department than the conduct of the attorneys.”
At the meeting, a file by a sheriff’s investigator was passed around and discussed.
The file included notes related to preparation of a 1998 draft affidavit to search Harris’ home. That file, prepared by Jefferson County sheriff’s Deputy Michael Guerra, has disappeared.
Critics such as the Browns suggest the file would have shown that authorities missed opportunities prior to Columbine that would have shown Harris to be a public threat.
The five attorneys at the meeting, held in a Jefferson County Open Space office and also attended by several members of the Sheriff’s Office, were then-District Attorney Dave Thomas, Assistant District Attorney Kathy Sasak, County Attorney Frank Hutfless, and Lily Oeffler and William Tuthill, from Hutfless’ office.
While excusing the attorneys, the report was critical of the Sheriff’s Office and called the “unexplained disappearance” of Guerra’s file “troubling.”
“The conduct of the sheriff’s department – which was the custodian of the lion’s share of the records pertaining to Columbine, including those at issue here – is disconcerting,” Gleason wrote.
Columbine and its aftermath occurred under the watch of former Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone, who didn’t run for re-election after one term.
In October 2003, Jefferson County Sheriff Ted Mink asked Attorney General Ken Salazar to lead an investigation into a newly discovered 1997 report about a violent Harris website. It uncovered information on the Guerra file and that it was, and remains, missing.
The Jefferson County attorney’s office referred questions on Monday to the Sheriff’s Office, which declined comment.
Randy Brown, who provided a copy of the response Monday, said he is “disappointed” and “distressed” by the counsel’s findings.
In a footnote of the report, Gleason states: “… the county actively represented itself as a friend to the victims and downplayed its adversary posture to them.”
“These attorneys are the ones who held back evidentiary items,” Brown said. “They withheld information from the families of murdered children to avoid lawsuits. That is why they should be disbarred.”
Staff writer Kieran Nicholson can be reached at 303-820-1822 or knicholson@denverpost.com.
