Will it ever end?
Columbine Student Hangs Himself
Seventeen-year-old Greg Barnes, Columbine High School's star basketball player, hanged himself on Thursday in an apparent suicide. "It's a somber mood at Columbine High School," said Jefferson County School District spokeswoman Rick Kaufman. Just two weeks ago, the school recognized the one-year anniversary of the massacre that left 14 students and one teacher dead. Barnes's suicide is the latest tragedy to strike the Colorado school. Friends said he did not seem depressed or angry. He had been a witness to some of the shootings on April 20, 1999, including that of teacher Dave Sanders. Last year, Barnes told Sports Illustrated that he saw the teacher and coach "take two shots, right in front of me." After he was notified of the suicide, varsity basketball coach Rudy Martin met with his players at the Barnes home. "I didn't know what to tell them," Martin said. "I don't know what to tell my own kids. For two years, their hero has been Greg Barnes." He said he had no inkling that Barnes was suicidal. "He stopped in and talked almost every day," Martin said. Barnes was also a good friend of one of the dead students, Matt Kechter. "Matt always waited by the mailbox for his little brother to come home from school," Barnes told The Associated Press after last year's shooting.
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