Fuselier Article

FBI investigator's son linked to case

Associated Press | May 8, 1999
By Kevin Vaughan and Hector Gutierrez

LITTLETON — One of the students who helped produce a 1997 video that's similar to the April 20 assault on Columbine High School is the son of the FBI's lead agent in the investigation.

The disclosure came as FBI agents sought lie-detector tests on people who were close to Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the two gunmen who stormed Columbine.

FBI agent Dwayne Fuselier, a psychologist, is one of three investigators heading the probe of the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history.

His son, 19-year-old Scott Fuselier, was one of those who helped produce the 1997 film, which has not been linked to Harris or Klebold.

In a call to the agent's home, a woman who answered the phone said, "Scott and the boys that are with that movie don't want to talk about it."

In a later call, Dwayne Fuselier, refused to comment.

"You can stop right there — nothing, goodbye," he said Thursday evening when a reporter began asking about his son's connection to the video.

The film depicts gun-toting, trench coat-wearing students moving through Columbine's halls and ends with a special-effects explosion of the school. The videotape was obtained by the syndicated television show Inside Edition. It was broadcast Wednesday.

A separate videotape, produced later by Harris and Klebold, shows gunmen shooting down a student who was harassing a classmate, according to students who've seen it.

When asked about the connection between Fuselier's son and the 1997 movie, FBI spokesman Gary Gomez said: "That's a non-issue, and I'm not going to comment on what kids are making in their video productions."

Asked whether the FBI would be concerned if the agent's son had been involved in making the video, Gomez said: "No, there would be no concern by the FBI."

Gomez said the video was a spoof on a mad scientist and had no similarities to the tape that Harris and Klebold produced, and that any inquiries about it would have to be made to Jefferson County school officials.

A student who helped in the production of the film, Brooks Brown, said the film looks "eerie" today, given what occurred at Columbine a little more than two weeks ago.

"It was a parody, done in humor," Brown said.

Brown, an underclassman when the film was made, said he had a small hand in editing it. He said it was supposed to spoof a play called "Get Smart."

On April 20, Harris, 18, and Klebold, 17, donned trench coats then stormed Columbine with guns and bombs, killing 12 students and a teacher and wounding 23 people before they took their own lives.

Among their weapons was a large propane bomb in the school's cafeteria that officials say would have severely damaged Columbine if it had detonated.

Scott Fuselier graduated from Columbine in 1997.

Brown said he is attending college out of state, where he is studying film production. The younger Fuselier could not be reached for comment.

Dwayne Fuselier, 51, is assisting Jefferson County sheriff's Capt. Dan Harris and Lt. John Kiekbusch in leading the investigation.

Fuselier is best known as one of the top negotiators in the "Freeman" standoff in Montana. He is a former member of an elite FBI squad known as the Crisis Management Unit.

Scott Fuselier is not considered a suspect in the April 20 shootings.

As investigators try to unravel what lead to the rampage, friends of Harris and Klebold are being asked to take lie-detector tests.

The tests are part of the search for accomplices in the assault on Columbine.

Jefferson County Sheriff John Stone and other investigators believe Harris and Klebold had help — if for no other reason than the two killers would have had a hard time carrying by themselves all the shotguns, assault weapons and bombs they used in the attack.

The FBI is handling the lie-detector tests.

Investigators also are trying to piece together every facet of the April 20 attack.

Agents from the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms worked in the school Thursday, gathering information for two models of the sprawling building that investigators will use to understand the sequence of events.

One model will be constructed with the use of computers.

Investigators hope to create a three-dimensional look at the crime scene that will allow them to move through each room of the school, panning for 360 degrees and locating each piece of evidence that was collected.

The second model will be structural, like those built by architects. It will cover the whole school and give investigators a compact look at the crime scene. 

About 75 investigators were working in seven teams. By Thursday, they had conducted more than 1,000 interviews and received about 1,800 tips.

At the same time, work was under way at the Colorado Bureau of Investigation to process thousands of pieces of physical evidence, including blood samples and hundreds of bullets and shell casings.

That ballistics and forensic work may help settle two questions:

Was a third gunman in the school that day?

Did Harris and Klebold both commit suicide, or did one of them kill his partner and then himself?

Investigators have found no physical evidence to indicate that a third person wielded weapons in the school.

A videotape from the school's cafeteria shows only Harris and Klebold, but some students who were at Columbine that day told investigators they believe a third person was firing a gun.

Investigators have not been able to rule out the possibility.

As for the question of Harris and Klebold's death, so far the Jefferson County coroner's office has said only that their wounds were "consistent" with suicide.