Father and son face charges in mass shooting at a Georgia school

ATLANTA
AP
—

A Georgia grand jury on Thursday indicted a father and son on murder charges in the mass shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder last month.

Georgia media reported that Thursday’s meeting of the Barrow County grand jury in Winder indicted 14-year-old Colt Gray on a total of 55 counts, including four counts of premeditated murder, four counts of aggravated murder, and aggravated assault and cruelty to children . His father, Colin Gray, faces 29 counts, including second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter and reckless conduct.

Deputy Clerk of Court Missy Headrick confirmed that Colin and Colt Gray were charged in separate indictments. She said the clerk’s office has not yet processed the charges and the documents likely won’t be available to the public until Friday.

Both are scheduled to appear for arraignment on November 21 and then formally enter their pleas. Colin Gray is being held in the Barrow County Jail. Colt Gray is being charged as an adult but is being held at a juvenile detention center in Gainesville. Neither has applied for bail and their lawyers have previously declined to comment.

Investigators testified Wednesday during a preliminary hearing for Colin Gray that Colt Gray was carrying a semi-automatic assault rifle on the school bus that morning, with the barrel sticking out of his book bag and wrapped in a poster board. They say the boy left his second period class and came out of a bathroom with the rifle before shooting people in a classroom and hallways.

Teachers Richard Aspinwall (39) and Cristina Irimie (53) and students Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo (both 14) were killed in the shooting. Another teacher and eight other students were injured, seven of whom were hit by gunfire.

Investigators said the teenager carefully planned the shooting at the 1,900-student high school northeast of Atlanta. A Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent testified that the boy left a notebook in his classroom with handwritten step-by-step instructions on how to prepare for the shooting. It included a diagram of his second-period classroom and his estimate that he could kill up to 26 people and injure up to 13 others, writing that he “would be surprised if I made it this far.”

There had long been signs that Colt Gray was in trouble.

Colt and Colin Gray were interviewed in May 2023 about an online threat related to Colt Gray. At the time, Colt Gray denied making the threat. He enrolled at Apalachee as a freshman after the school year began and then skipped several days of school. Investigators said he suffered a “severe anxiety attack” on August 14. A counselor said he had suicidal thoughts and was rocking and shaking uncontrollably in her office.

Colt’s mother, Marcee Gray, who was separated, told investigators she argued with Colin Gray and asked him to secure his guns and limit Colt’s access in August. Instead, he bought the boy ammunition, a sight and other shooting supplies, records show.

After Colt Gray asked his mother to put him in a “lunatic asylum,” the family arranged to have him transferred to a psychiatric treatment center in Athens that offers inpatient treatment on August 31, but the plan fell through when his parents complained about Colt Illness disputes An investigator said he had been given access to weapons the day before and his father said he had no gas money.

The indictment of Colin Gray is the latest example of prosecutors holding parents responsible for their children’s actions in school shootings. Michigan parents Jennifer and James Crumbley, the first to be convicted in a mass school shooting in the U.S., have been sentenced to at least 10 years in prison for failing to provide a firearm at home and for their indifference to signs of deterioration her son’s mental health before he killed four students in 2021.

“In this case, Your Honor, he had sole custody of Colt. He knew about Colt’s obsession with school shooters. He knew Colt’s mental state was deteriorating. And he provided the firearms and ammunition that Colt used in doing so,” District Attorney Brad Smith told the judge at Wednesday’s preliminary hearing.