The families of the Columbine High School victims, and some of those who survived the 1999 attack on the school, got their first look Wednesday at the extraordinary collection of evidence in the case - the guns and the trench coats, the bullets and the bombs.
The unprecedented display was carried out under tight security in an auditorium at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds, a precursor for the transfer of the evidence to the state archives and another step in an effort to quell the controversy surrounding the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history.
Those who were allowed into the private viewing used words such as staggering and overwhelming to describe what they saw.
"You really have to stand back and say, 'Wow,' " said Don Fleming, whose daughter, Kelly, was slain in the Columbine library.
There were the gasoline jugs and the propane tanks taken from the cars of the killers. Bullet- scarred chairs from the school library. Videotapes of the autopsies of those who died. Hundreds of bullet fragments, shell casings and bomb parts.
And the guns themselves - a semiautomatic pistol, a black rifle, two shotguns with their barrels sawed off and their stocks cut down.
"That was tough," said Joe Kechter, whose son, Matt, was also killed in the library.
But there was one thing the families didn't get Wednesday that they had been expecting: Attorney General Ken Salazar's independent investigation into the handling of reports about killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold made in the two years before they attacked the school.
That will come today. Salazar plans to present it to the families this morning and then make it public.
Also scheduled for today is the public release of a 94-minute video montage of images of the Columbine killers and a 38- minute videotape of the crowd outside the school after the shootings, apparently filmed by an investigator.
The case has been surrounded by controversy almost from the moment that Harris and Klebold, both Columbine seniors, attacked their school April 20, 1999. They had planted two large bombs in the school cafeteria that they hoped would kill hundreds of their classmates, but the bombs didn't explode.
So they opened fire with their guns, killed a dozen students and a teacher, wounded more than 20 others and then took their own lives.
Before Wednesday, some of the families of the victims had seen only bits and pieces of the evidence. Some of them hadn't seen any of it.
But Jefferson County Sheriff Ted Mink and Salazar, looking for ways to both rebuild the trust of the families of the victims and answer lingering questions about the tragedy, decided that opening the evidence to public inspection was a necessary step.
The families were invited to the fairgrounds beginning at 3 p.m. Wednesday.
They parked in a lot cordoned off with yellow police tape and walked to the nearby auditorium. As they approached, a flashing highway sign greeted them:
"No bags."
"ID req'rd."
"No purses."
About 60 people took advantage of the chance to see the evidence.
The meeting began with Salazar, Deputy Attorney General Mike Goodbee, Mink and Jefferson County District Attorney Dave Thomas appearing before the crowd.
Salazar told the families his report wasn't ready for them.
Salazar launched his investigation in October, at Mink's request, after a sheriff's investigator found a 1997 memo in the sleeve of a three-ring binder. The memo indicated that someone had reported Harris and Klebold's activities to the sheriff's office much earlier than had been previously known.
"He just said, 'Look, sorry, I'm still putting it together,' " said Dale Todd, whose son, Evan, suffered shotgun wounds in the attack.
Goodbee, who headed the investigation, went back to his office Wednesday evening to finish the report.
There were a few questions, but none of the anger and hostility that has marked so many Columbine meetings.
Families were given the chance to watch the videotapes of Harris and Klebold and the crowd outside the school, but were told they couldn't have copies until at least today.
Then they had as much as four hours to walk through the auditorium and look at the evidence, which was guarded by an army of sheriff's deputies.
The evidence was arranged according to the area of the school where it was collected - the library, the math and science wing, and the cafeteria.
Some of it was displayed in giant lockers.
Other items, such as the two shotguns, the rifle and the pistol that Harris and Klebold used that day, were kept in glass cases.
Brian Rohrbough, one of the most vocal critics of former Sheriff John Stone, said the gathering "offers a steppingstone in the right direction."
He praised Salazar and Mink and added, "This is a different sheriff."
Still, the sheer volume of evidence - and the realization that before them were the tools used to kill and maim - was difficult for some people to digest.
"I felt like I was in a museum," said Dawn Anna, whose daughter, Lauren Townsend, was killed in the library.
Patricia DePooter, whose son, Corey, was killed at Columbine, said looking at the evidence was not the worst for her.
"Nothing can be any more horrible than to see your son's bloody chalk line," she said.
DePooter was asked whether she thought Columbine could have been prevented if police had taken a different approach toward Harris and Klebold in the years before the shootings.
"Well, they didn't, and we have to live with that," she said.
vaughank@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-5019 Staff writer Peggy Lowe contributed to this report.
