OAN Staff Brooke Mallory
3:43 PM – Thursday, September 5, 2024
UPDATE 5:29 P.M. PST– The GBI announced on Thursday that Colin Gray, 54, Colt’s father, has been charged with eight counts of child abuse, two counts of second-degree murder, and four counts of involuntary manslaughter.
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Federal authorities confirmed that the 14-year-old boy accused of fatally shooting four people, two students and two teachers, at his Georgia high school on Wednesday was previously investigated in relation to threats to carry out a school shooting.
Colt Gray, the suspect, who was 13-years-old at the time, was involved in communicating threats that were posted online last year, according to a joint statement from the FBI’s Atlanta field office and the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office.
“The threats … which included pictures of guns … were to commit a future school shooting — but no mention of when or where,” TMZ reported.
According to the statement, law enforcement officials spoke with the gunman—who is not named in the statement but was previously identified as Gray by local authorities—in relation to the threats within a day.
The statement went on to say that the suspect denied making the threats. The testimony from his father, who was also questioned by police, claimed that although there were hunting rifles in the house, his son did not have unsupervised access to them.
According to the statement, authorities advised nearby schools to keep an eye on the suspect even though there was no probable cause to make an arrest.
Director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Chris Hosey stated that investigators are examining a potential link between the shooting on Wednesday and the 2023 threat.
About 45 miles northeast of Atlanta, near Apalachee High School, gunfire was reported at about 10:20 a.m., according to Hosey. After being “engaged” by a sheriff’s deputy acting as a school resource officer, the adolescent turned himself in, according to the authorities.
“The shooter quickly realized that if he did not give up, it would end with an OIS,” said Barrow County Sheriff Jud Smith at a news conference, using the acronym “OIS” for an “officer-involved shooting.”
“He got on the ground, and the deputy took him into custody,” Smith said.
After the assailant opened fire with what Hosey characterized as an “AR platform-style weapon,” four individuals were killed.
The victims: Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, two 14-year-old students, as well as teachers Richard Aspinwall, 39, and Christina Irimie, 53, were identified by the bureau.
On the school’s website, Aspinwall and Irimie both listed their positions as math teachers. Aspinwall was also a defensive coordinator who oversaw the football team.
According to a statement from the agency, nine additional persons were also injured in the shooting, eight teachers and one student. These victims’ names were left out of the announcement.
Hosey maintained that the suspect will face four felony counts of murder and will be tried in court as an adult, even though he is a minor.
It’s still unclear why the suspect opened fire, and Smith added that it’s unknown if the suspect had any particular targets in mind or if he was just shooting whomever was closest to his vicinity. The teen is being questioned by detectives from both his office and the state law enforcement agency, according to the sheriff.
Apalachee High School is part of the Barrow County School District, whose superintendent announced that the district will close its doors for the remainder of the week “as we fully cooperate to get answers to the many questions we have about what happened here.”
Meanwhile, Democrat presidential nominee Kamala Harris took advantage of the tragic incident by further demonizing firearms at a New Hampshire rally, saying, “We have to end this epidemic of gun violence.”
On the other hand, Donald Trump condemned the assailant, referring to the 14-year-old as “sick and deranged” on his online platform, Truth Social.
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