Early Friday morning at Georgia's Barrow County Superior Court, Colt Gray and his father Colin made their first appearances in front of a judge following the murder of four people at Apalachee High School on Wednesday.
Colin, 14, is the suspect being charged as an adult with the murders and his father Colin, 54, faces four counts of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of second-degree murder and eight counts of cruelty to children, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said.
Colt, who appeared in court first, was told by Judicial Circuit Judge Currie M. Mingledorff II that his penalties would not include death because he is under 18 years old. A preliminary hearing was set for Dec. 4.
Colin, 54, was brought into court afterward and was told by the judge that he faces a maximum 180 years in prison if convicted, which includes a 30-year maximum sentence on each of the second-degree murder charges he faces. His preliminary hearing was also set for Dec. 4.
Both Grays have temporary attorneys and plan to obtain alternate counsel by later today. Neither of them are seeking bond at this time.
Questions about the gun
An investigation is underway to determine if the AR-style weapon allegedly used in the killings was purchased by the boy's father and given to him as a gift, sources with knowledge of the investigation told CBS News.
"These charges stem from Mr. Gray knowingly allowing his son Colt to possess a weapon," announced Chris Hosey, director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigations, at a Thursday evening news conference, when speaking about Colin Gray's arrest.
The shooting Wednesday killed 14-year-old students Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, and educators Richard Aspinwall and Christina Irimie. Nine other people were injured in the shooting — two teachers and seven students, officials specified Thursday night. A bit of good news emerged from Thursday's update, as authorities said "all nine will make a full recovery and be able to leave the hospital."
Prior warnings
A Jackson County, Ga., police report obtained by Yahoo News found that users of the social media platform Discord had reached out to the FBI in May 2023 warning that someone was threatening to shoot an unspecified middle school in the area.
Hours after Colt Gray allegedly killed four people and injured nine others at Apalachee High School in Georgia on Wednesday, the FBI Atlanta division said that it had received those anonymous tips and that Jackson County officials had looked into Gray as the suspect.
“The Jackson County Sheriff’s Office located a possible subject, a 13-year-old male, and interviewed him and his father,” the FBI wrote. “The father stated he had hunting guns in the house, but the subject did not have unsupervised access to them. The subject denied making the threats online.”
Investigators spoke to the Grays in May 2023
Following the tips from Discord users, authorities went to the Grays’ residence and spoke to both Colt, who was then 13 and a student at Jefferson Middle School in Georgia, and his father, Colin, according to the report. Colin denied knowing what Discord was, and Colt said he had deactivated his Discord account months prior. Discord is a free messaging app, predominantly used in the gaming community.
“Colt expressed concern that someone is accusing him of threatening to shoot up a school, stating that he would never say such a thing, even in a joking manner,” the report says. “Colt stated he stopped using Discord because too many people kept hacking his account and he was afraid someone would use his information for nefarious purposes.”
The tip the FBI received about the Discord account said it had been created in April 2023 — after Colt said he deleted his account. Screenshots of the Discord account showed that the username was in Russian and that the translation of the Russian letters spelled out the name Lanza. Authorities thought this referred to Adam Lanza, the 20-year-old who committed the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in December 2012.
“Due to the inconsistent nature of the information received by the FBI, the allegation that Colt or Colin is the user behind the Discord account that made the threat cannot be substantiated,” the report concluded. “This case will be exceptionally cleared.”
“The threats were generic and not a specific location or time,” a spokesperson for the FBI Atlanta division told Yahoo News on Thursday. “At this time, we don’t have further information to share other than what was in our statement on our social media channels.”
New charges
While there is not a lot of precedent in charging the parents of minors involved in shootings, Michael Lawlor, a lawyer and associate professor of criminal justice at the University of New Haven, pointed to the April conviction of Jennifer and James Crumbley, whose son, Ethan, killed four students at Michigan's Oxford High School in 2021.
According to Lawlor, there are two key elements authorities had to consider when determining whether to criminally prosecute Gray's parents for the Apalachee shooting.
“If it can be proven that the 14-year-old actually did have unfettered access to the AR platform weapon used in the shooting [which would mean they lied to investigators in 2023] and if it could be proven that the parents were aware of his homicidal postings, then a conviction would certainly be possible,” Lawlor told Yahoo News prior to the announcement that Colin Gray had been charged.
The Crumbleys were accused of not properly securing their newly purchased gun at home, which Ethan later brought to school, and for not taking appropriate actions following signs of their son's mental health decline, even after being shown a violent and disturbing drawing Ethan had done.
The Crumbleys were the first parents to be convicted in a U.S. mass school shooting committed by their child and were sentenced to at least 10 years in prison.
The statute says anyone convicted of involuntary manslaughter can face up to 10 years in prison.
President Biden appeared to broach the issue Thursday afternoon in Westby, Wisc.
“There are too many people who are able to access guns that shouldn’t be able to. Let’s require safe storage of firearms. I know I have mine locked up. How could you not have an assault rifle, a weapon in a house, not locked up and knowing your kid knows where it is? You gotta hold parents accountable if they let their child have access to these guns,” Biden said. Authorities have not said where Gray obtained the AR-style rifle he's alleged to have used in the shootings.
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