Red Lake families reach settlement in 2005 shooting
Families of victims and survivors of the 2005 school shooting on the Red Lake Indian Reservation have reached an undisclosed settlement with the company hired to come up with crisis plans for the school.
A hearing on the settlement between the plaintiffs and Burnsville-based MacNeil Environmental Inc. is set for 4 p.m. next Tuesday in Hennepin County District Court before Judge Lloyd B. Zimmerman.
"The parties have reached an amicable resolution of the case without any admission of liability by MacNeil Environmental," said Philip Sieff, an attorney for many of the victims' families.
Roger Gross, an attorney for MacNeil Environmental, reiterated that statement to The Associated Press on Tuesday. Neither attorney released details of the settlement, reached last month. Details were not available in court documents.
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"No amount of money will bring my son, or the other victims' lives, back," Francis Brun, 73, of Red Lake, said Tuesday.
His son, 28-year-old Derrick Brun, was a security guard at Red Lake High School and was killed when teen gunman Jeffrey Weise began his attack at the school on March 21, 2005. Weise, 16, killed seven people at the school before killing himself. He also killed his grandfather and his grandfather's girlfriend earlier in the day.
Others were injured at the school, including two students who suffered brain injuries and, according to their attorneys, will need ongoing care.
The lawsuits filed on behalf of about two dozen people - including injured students, teachers and victims' family members - alleged that MacNeil Environmental wasn't qualified to create an emergency plan for the Red Lake School District and that it failed to follow through on developing and implementing crisis plans.
MacNeil Environmental describes itself on its Web site as a consulting and engineering firm providing schools and other public organizations with health and safety management programs.
According to the lawsuits, MacNeil was supposed to help the Red Lake School District implement a five-year program starting in fall 2001 to provide a crisis management plan, train school officials and evaluate the school's security weaknesses. Minnesota law was changed after the school shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., to require such crisis management plans.
The lawsuits claimed MacNeil failed to develop a plan as recommended by the U.S. Department of Education and provided the school district with plans that were confusing and contained conflicting directions for staff.
A separate lawsuit against the school district was settled in 2006 for $1 million and distributed among 21 families of shooting victims.
(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
