Police warned father about son’s school shooting threats a year before attack

WINDER, Ga. (CN) — On the fourth day of Colin Gray’s trial Thursday, jurors saw body camera footage in which authorities questioned him about school shooting threats made online by his son, Colt Gray, a year before Colt committed Georgia’s deadliest school shooting.

The footage showed two Jackson County Police Officers approach Colin Gray’s residence on May 21, 2023 and inform him that they had received a tip from the FBI that threats to “shoot up a school” were traced to his IP address and Colt Gray’s account on Discord, a messaging platform.

Colin Gray told the officers that he and his son had recently moved to Jackson County after being evicted from his former home and separating from his wife, who moved to a different county with their other two younger children.

“In the beginning, he kind of struggled a bit,” Colin Gray told them.

“But he’s been doing really good,” the father said about their recent move.

When asked if he had any firearms in the home, Colin Gray responded yes, but that none were loaded. He said he and his son would go deer hunting together.

“I’m gonna be mad as hell if he did say that,” Colin Gray added.

He then assured the officers that if his 13-year-old son was found to be responsible for the online threats, then “all the guns will go away.”

But the father never followed through with his promise after Colt Gray denied making any threats and told the officers that his Discord account had been hacked.

On Sept. 4, 2024, Colt Gray would be arrested for using a semi-automatic rifle to open fire on students and staff at Apalachee High School, killing two other 14-year-old students and two teachers. Several others were injured.

Jackson County Sheriff’s Deputy Investigator, Dan Miller, testified Thursday that he took the father and son at their word and, other than a phone call the following day, never followed back up with them.

Miller said he advised Colin Gray to keep his guns out of his son’s reach, but that he couldn’t “tell him or force him to put guns in a safe without a specific court order to enforce that.”

The footage is crucial to prosecutors’ claims that Colin Gray ignored warning signs and continued to allow his teenage son unfettered access to an assault rifle and ammunition. He faces 29 charges, including second-degree murder, manslaughter, cruelty to children and reckless conduct.

Defense attorneys emphasized that Colin Gray told the officers that day, “this is no joke.”

He also told officers that he was very involved in his son’s education and that he was at his school frequently. But testimony from school officials painted a contradicting picture.

Carol Ann Knight, the principal at Jefferson Middle School, where he attended most of seventh grade from September 2022 to May 2023, testified that it was very difficult to get in contact with Colt Gray’s parents about his numerous unexcused absences from school.

Knight said it “felt like he was struggling to fit in and needed a person to check in,” leading her to eventually making a visit to Colt Gray’s home, where she was again unable to speak with a parent, but met with his grandmother.

“Colt was troubled and needed help,” Knight said.

The administrator also said that Colt Gray was disciplined during the first three weeks of school for covering a bathroom with graffiti. This was not the first instance of behavioral issues from Colt Gray, according to the assistant principal of his previous middle school.

Stephen Greene, the assistant principal of Haymon Morris Middle School in Barrow County, said Colt Gray received in-school suspension for drawing swastikas and profane language on school calculators and for leaving the cafeteria without permission. Greene added that he also got into a physical altercation with another student at one point, which the defense exploited to further their argument that Colt Gray’s actions were a result of bullying, not parental neglect.

Prosecutors also brought in Department of Family and Children Service case workers who monitored the family for years, including Mykayla Anderson.

Anderson said that she checked on Colt Gray monthly, and that he had expressed having anger towards his mother, Marcee Gray. But when she advised his father to get him into therapy about it, he told her, “it didn’t seem necessary.”

Colt Gray and his two younger siblings were ultimately removed from their mother’s care after she tested positive for drugs.

Jurors were also shown body camera footage of the tense moments when deputies arrived at the Grays’ home two hours after the violence unfolded at Apalachee High and Colt Gray was detained.

“God! I knew it, man. My little girl just texted me,” a seemingly distraught Gray told deputies in his driveway. “She’s in middle school. She said we’re in lockdown. I said, ‘God, almighty, please tell me your brother didn’t do something.’”

Prosecutors will continue to present their case Friday as the trial is expected to last two more weeks.

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