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There were warning signs. There often are. A disaffected young person, usually male, posts pictures of guns and unapologetic messages about killing people at a school.
Deadly school violence materialized again this week in a rural area of Georgia, near Atlanta. Authorities say 14-year-old Colt Gray took a semi-automatic rifle to Apalachee High School Wednesday and killed four people before being confronted and surrendering to a school resource officer.
Gray has been charged with four counts of felony murder. The world knows the boy’s name because Georgia officials wasted no time charging him as an adult, depriving the accused shooter of the public anonymity generally accorded to juvenile delinquents.
On Friday morning another development surrounding the latest school shooting was announced. Colin Gray, the father of the accused, appeared in court and faces two counts of second-degree murder, four counts of involuntary manslaughter and eight counts of cruelty to children.
An arrest warrant affidavit states that the elder Gray gave his son a semi-automatic weapon — an AR-style rifle — “with knowledge he was a threat to himself and others,” and even though the son had investigated by the FBI last spring for making terrorist threats against a middle school.
The sharply pointed prosecutorial decision against the elder Gray seems necessary. It seeks to explore and perhaps expand the culpability of the crime. It is premised in the question of criminal neglect. This is an encouraging legal development. When juveniles turn schools into hunting grounds, when should parents or guardians be held jointly responsible for failing to intervene to save lives?
