Georgia Teen Charged in High School Shooting Enters Not Guilty Plea

Colt Gray, 14, has pleaded not guilty to charges related to the fatal mass shooting at Georgia’s Apalachee High School that left four people dead.
Charged as an adult, Gray faces 55 counts, including murder, in the deaths of four people and 25 counts of aggravated assault at the high school, following the September 4 shooting that took the lives of two teachers, Richard Aspinwall and Cristina Irimie, along with two students, Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, both 14. Eight other students and one teacher were also injured as seven of them were hit by gunfire.
On Tuesday, Gray’s lawyer filed papers entering the not guilty plea after he was indicted on Thursday.
They waived an arraignment hearing, which is common in Georgia after entering a plea, that had been scheduled for November 21.
According to authorities, Gray carried a semiautomatic assault-style rifle onto a school bus with its barrel sticking out of his book bag and wrapped up in a poster board. He left his second-period class and emerged from a bathroom with the rifle before shooting people in a classroom and hallways. Authorities say Gray meticulously planned the attack, drawing diagrams and creating a disturbing “shrine” to other mass school shooters.
The indictment also implicates Colt’s father, Colin Gray, who faces 29 counts, including two counts of manslaughter and two counts of second-degree murder. Both also face multiple counts of cruelty to children.
Authorities allege that Colin Gray failed to secure firearms despite warnings from the teen’s mother, Marcee Gray, about their son’s deteriorating mental health and potential danger. Marcee had reportedly asked Colin to lock up his weapons weeks before the shooting, which Colt allegedly used to carry out the shooting. The teen had been discussing counseling and inpatient psychiatric treatment with school officials prior to the attack.
Colin Gray has not yet entered a plea as of Tuesday and remained scheduled for his own arraignment on November 21.
Colt Gray is currently held at a juvenile detention center, while his father remains in the Barrow County jail in Georgia. Neither has sought to be released on bail.
The case follows a broader trend of holding parents accountable for their children’s actions in school shootings, as seen in the Michigan case of Jennifer and James Crumbley, who were the first to be convicted in a U.S. mass school shooting. They were sentenced to at least 10 years in prison for not securing a firearm at home and acting indifferently to signs of their son’s deteriorating mental health before he killed four students in 2021.
This article includes reporting from The Associated Press.