No one, including convicted murderer Patricia Columbo, was surprised Tuesday when the Illin ois Prisoner Review Board announced it had denied parole a fifth time to the Elk Grove Village woman who killed her parents and 13-year-old brothe r in 1976.

"She wasn't suprised," said attorney Margaret Byrne, who represented Columbo at her June 18 parole hearing at the Dwight Correcti onal Center. "She's realistic, she's an intelligent person and she's just doing the best she can at Dwight right now, which is pretty good."

Thomas E. Epach, who represented the Cook County state's attorney's offi ce at the hearing, said he had also expected Columbo's parole request to be rejected.

"We feel strongly that her sentence is just beginning, " Epach said. "She killed her father, she killed her mother, and she kill ed her brother, which is the hat trick of evil."

Columbo was 19 yea rs old when she and her 39-year-old lover, Frank DeLuca, fatally shot Col umbo's parents and brother in the family's northwest suburban home. Colum bo's brother, Michael, also was stabbed 97 times and her mother, Mary, ha d her throat slit.

Prosecutors argued at Columbo's 1977 trial that she and DeLuca killed the family because her parents disapproved of their relationship, and Patricia Columbo hoped to collect a large inheritance after their deaths.

Columbo and DeLuca each were sentenced to 200 t o 300 years in prison after their convictions for murder and solicitation to commit murder.

During her parole hearing last month, Columbo, n ow 35, told a three-member review panel she had found "some redemption" f or her crimes through her prison work tutoring fellow inmates.

"It' s really a motivating force for what I do here today," she said. "Althoug h I can never make up for what I've done in the past, it's an area where I can find some redemption."

But in its unanimous decision to deny Columbo parole, the 12-member review board said freeing her would "indica te utter disrespect for the law and deprecate the seriousness of the offe nse."

The board scheduled another parole hearing for Columbo in Jun e 1992.

Byrne said that despite the review board's latest decision, she is confident Columbo will eventually be freed.

"She was only 1 9 when this occurred and I think she has undergone a transformation in pr ison," said Byrne, who has been assisting Columbo the past five years.

"She has never responded while in prison in any violent fashion to an y frustration or confrontation, and she has never received any disciplina ry tickets," Byrne said.

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PHOTO: For a fifth time, th e Illinois Prisoner Review Board denies parole to convicted murderer Patr icia Columbo (left). (Page 1.)