Georgia high school shooting suspect was obsessed with prior school shootings

The Georgia teenager who killed four people and wounded nine others in a shooting at Apalachee High School on Wednesday was interested in prior school shootings, according to multiple reports.

Colt Gray, a 14-year-old student of the school, was arrested at the scene northeast of Atlanta and later charged with four counts of murder. Additional charges are expected.

His first court appearance is scheduled for Friday.

Gray was allegedly “obsessed” with the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High in Parkland, Fla., where former student Nikolas Cruz killed 17 people and wounded 17 others, sources told the New York Times.

In May 2023, authorities in Jackson County, Ga., investigated Gray after receiving a tip that he made threats online about shooting up a middle school. Gray, 13 at the time, denied making the threats, and his father said he knew nothing about them.

The threats came from a Discord account with a Russian username. According to an incident report obtained by Atlanta’s WSB-TV, “translation of the Russian letters spells out the name Lanza, referring to Adam Lanza,” the 20-year-old man who killed 20 children and six staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in 2012.

On Wednesday, the FBI and the local sheriff’s office said they hadn’t compiled enough evidence to arrest Gray or his father at the time, only issuing a warning to local schools for “continued monitoring” of the teen.

However, Discord representatives told TMZ on Thursday that Gray’s account was banned that May, six weeks after it was created in early April 2023, for violating the platform’s anti-extremism policy.

“Discord’s Safety Team immediately responded to law enforcement,” handed over information related to the investigation into the threats and removed the account, a rep told the outlet. The company said it had no record of Gray using the platform between then and Wednesday’s shooting.

Students at Apalachee High who were interviewed on Wednesday told reporters Gray fit the stereotype of a school shooter and often skipped school. Authorities said Wednesday was Gray’s second day attending school, even though the year began on Aug. 1.

“He skips usually, so you never really know where he’s going,” Lyela Sayarath told CNN, describing how Gray walked out of their math class before attempting to return with a firearm. The door had automatically locked behind him, she said, so he opened fire in the classroom next door.

Barrow County Sheriff Jud Smith said officers located Gray “five or six minutes” after the call for help went out. Gray complied with the officers’ commands immediately and was taken into custody.

“It was carnage. There was blood everywhere,” Smith told NBC News in an interview. “You could smell the gunpowder. Lotta screaming, yelling. Little bit of chaos.”

Students Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, both 14, and teachers Richard Aspinwall, 39, and Christina Irimie, 53, were identified Thursday as the victims. Aspinwall was also the defensive coordinator for the school’s football team, which canceled a game scheduled for Friday.

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