Columbine memorials spark families' lawsuit

Relatives of students killed in the April shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, have sued the Jefferson County School District, claiming that they were not allowed to use religious themes in a display of memorial tiles in the school's hallways. The Rutherford Institute, a conservative civil liberties organization based in Charlottesville, Virginia, is representing the relatives. The suit, filed October 4, seeks damages because they believe the school has violated their First Amendment rights of freedom of religious expression and free speech.

"In the midst of extreme suffering and grief, the school district's hostility to the religious beliefs that have sustained these families is disturbing," said John W. Whitehead, president of the institute. "The Rutherford Institute is standing alongside these family members to ensure that government is not permitted to censor the religious faith that has upheld them and millions of other Americans throughout this tragedy."

The institute said that before the new school year began, Columbine High School invited parents and other relatives of the victims to decorate files that line the school's hallways as a way of remembering those who died. When the parents arrived at the school, they were told they could not include religious messages on the tiles.

Parents objected, so the school officials decided to permit the religious content. Later, however, the officials changed their minds and stuck with their first decision to forbid religious messages. One tile that depicted a small yellow cross and a red rose was later removed, the institute said. School district spokeswoman Marilyn Saltzman declined to comment. She said school officials had not yet seen the lawsuit.

Meanwhile, there is speculation that Cassie Bernall, the Columbine shooting victim held up as a martyr, may not have been the student who said yes when asked by one of the gunmen if she believed in God. Val Schnurr, 19, said in the September 28 edition of the Denver Post that she made that response after a shotgun blast knocked her out from under a library table where she had been hiding during the April attack.

According to Schnurr, she pleaded "Oh my God, oh my God, don't let me die" as she bled from her wounds. That, she said, prompted one of the student shooters to ask her if she believed in God and she replied yes. Schnurr, who suffered more than 30 shotgun wounds, said she crawled away as the gunman reloaded. Lauren Townsend, a friend who was hiding with Schnurr, was killed, along with Bernall, ten other students and a teacher. The two teen-age gunmen killed themselves.

Police said a student who helped authorities retrace the events in the library got sick when he realized it was Schnurr's table, not Bernall's, that he was pointing out in describing the exchange between victim and gunman. Sheriff's spokesman Steve Davis said investigators have not placed a priority on figuring out who said yes.

"We have conflicting witness statements from several kids who were in the library," Davis said. "But this is not something we're out to prove or disprove. It's not really a part of the investigation we're doing."

Schnurr, who now attends college, said she does not know whether Bernall was asked the same question in the final moments of her life. "I don't want to be famous or deemed anything," she said. "I said I believed in God out of respect for myself and respect for God. That's it."

Bernall, whose story has received much publicity, has been held up as a role model for her turn toward God and away from the wrong crowd and experimentation with drugs and the occult. Her mother, Misty Bernall, recently wrote a book titled She Said Yes: The Unlikely Martyrdom of Cassie Bernall.

COPYRIGHT 1999 The Christian Century Foundation
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