A jury found Colin Gray criminally responsible for giving his teenage son access to the rifle used in the Apalachee High School attack.
WINDER, Ga. — A Georgia judge sentenced Colin Gray to 15 years in prison Thursday for giving his teenage son the rifle used to kill two students and two teachers at Apalachee High School in 2024.
Gray, 55, was convicted in March of 27 charges, including second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter, second-degree cruelty to children and reckless conduct. The case is among a small but growing number of prosecutions seeking to hold parents criminally responsible when their children use improperly secured firearms in mass shootings.
Chief Judge Nicholas Primm imposed 15-year sentences for each of the second-degree murder counts and ordered the terms to run at the same time. Lesser sentences on the remaining counts will also run concurrently, leaving Gray with a total prison term of 15 years.
Primm told Gray that he had failed to act as warning signs surrounding his son became increasingly serious. The judge said Gray could have locked up the firearms, removed ammunition from the home, placed the weapons with another person or arranged counseling for his son.
“You were convicted because the warning lights were flashing brighter and brighter and you didn’t get him help and you didn’t remove his access to the guns,” Primm said.
Colt Gray was 14 when he carried an AR-15-style rifle into Apalachee High School on Sept. 4, 2024. He fatally shot students Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, both 14, and teachers Richard Aspinwall, 39, and Cristina Irimie, 53. Another teacher and eight students were injured, including seven people who were struck by gunfire.
Colt Gray, now 16, pleaded guilty to 55 charges, including murder and aggravated assault. Primm sentenced him Tuesday to life in prison without the possibility of parole, two days before his father appeared before the same judge.
Prosecutors said Colin Gray gave his son the rifle as a Christmas gift, along with ammunition, a gun sight and other shooting equipment. They argued that he did so despite knowing the boy was struggling with his mental health and had developed a strong interest in mass shootings.
Testimony during Colin Gray’s trial showed that his son participated in an online community where young people discussed mass killers. Prosecutors also said the teenager kept photographs and news coverage of the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in his bedroom.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation had questioned Colt Gray and his father in 2023 after receiving a report about online threats to carry out a school shooting. The boy denied making the threats, and authorities did not have enough evidence at the time to make an arrest. An investigator advised the father to keep firearms secured and away from his son.
Colin Gray testified at trial that he gave his son the rifle under rules that limited its use to trips to a shooting range. He said he did not believe the teenager would carry out an attack and did not recognize behavior that suggested such violence was coming.
Prosecutors requested an 80-year prison sentence, saying Gray ignored a substantial and unjustifiable risk. District Attorney Brad Smith argued that Gray provided his son with the precise weapon needed to carry out the attack despite repeated signs that the teenager needed intervention.
Defense lawyers asked for 10 years in prison followed by 10 years of probation. They argued that Colt Gray hid the depth of his involvement in online groups focused on mass shootings and that his father misunderstood the seriousness of the warning signs.
Primm said the sentencing required him to distinguish between the teenager’s deliberate attack and his father’s criminal negligence. The judge said Colin Gray had not intended to commit the crimes but had made decisions closely connected to the deaths and injuries.
Family members of those killed and injured described lasting grief and trauma during the hearing. Breanna Schermerhorn, Mason’s mother, said the shooting was preventable and that decisions made in the Gray home left four families with lifelong grief.
Shayna Aspinwall, whose husband was killed, told the court that Colin Gray did not fire the weapon but bought it and left it accessible to a minor. She urged the judge to consider the continuing harm suffered by the victims’ families and the wider school community.
Colin Gray declined to address the court before receiving his sentence. Primm said the ruling closes the legal proceedings against the father but does not end the pain caused by the shooting.
The sentence follows the 2024 convictions of Jennifer and James Crumbley, whose teenage son killed four students at Oxford High School in Michigan. Each parent received a sentence of 10 to 15 years for involuntary manslaughter after prosecutors argued they ignored warning signs and failed to secure a gun used in the attack.
With both Colin and Colt Gray now sentenced, the primary criminal cases arising from the Apalachee High School shooting have concluded. The father will remain in state custody under the 15-year sentence imposed Thursday.
Author note: Last updated July 31, 2026.