A Georgia jury on Tuesday convicted the father of a school shooter of second-degree murder and involuntary manslaughter in a landmark case that held a parent criminally responsible for the actions of his child in a deadly school shooting.
The verdict delivered to Colin Gray marks one of the few times in the United States that a parent has been found guilty in connection with a mass shooting carried out by a minor. His son, Colt, killed two people on Sept. 4, 2024.
Jurors in Barrow County Superior Court deliberated for less than two hours before finding the 55-year-old Gray guilty on 27 counts, including murder, manslaughter, reckless conduct, and cruelty to children.
Prosecutors said Gray provided the semiautomatic rifle his son allegedly used in the September 2024 attack at Apalachee High School, where two students and two teachers were killed, and eight others were injured.
Gray showed little emotion as the verdict was read. Deputies later handcuffed him at the defense table, and he will be sentenced at a later date.
Prosecutors argued that Gray “gave his son access to a gun and ammunition after receiving sufficient warning that his 14-year-old son, Colt Gray, would harm others.”
Under Georgia law, second-degree murder can include causing the death of a child by committing cruelty to children, and involuntary manslaughter involves unintentional killing during the commission of a reckless act.
Colt Gray, now 16, faces a separate criminal trial and has been charged as an adult with 55 counts, including murder and aggravated assault. He has not pleaded guilty, and a status hearing in his case is scheduled for mid-March.
Investigators say the then-14-year-old Colt boarded a school bus with the rifle hidden in a backpack and later retrieved it from a bathroom before opening fire in classrooms and hallways, investigators said.
Colt Gray’s mother testified during the trial and said she had urged his father to lock up any guns inside his truck so they were not accessible to his son. Colt Gray’s parents were separated in the months leading up to the school shooting, and he primarily stayed with his father.
Colin Gray’s defense had acknowledged his son’s troubled behavior, including having a shrine in his bedroom to Nikolas Cruz, the shooter in the 2018 massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
During the trial, Colin Gray testified that the Christmas gift of a rifle was meant for hunting and bonding, and he expressed regret for not doing more to secure firearms in the home.
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The case is one of several nationwide in recent years in which authorities have pursued criminal charges against parents of school shooters, a legal strategy aimed at addressing parental responsibility for minors’ access to firearms.
In a well-known 2021 case in Michigan, the parents of a teenager who killed four students at Oxford High School were convicted of involuntary manslaughter for giving their son a gun and ignoring warning signs.