Staff at Apalachee High School searched for the wrong student when warned Colt Gray could be planning a school shooting — instead frantically searching for his similarly named classmate Colton Gray.
The hunt started last Wednesday when Colt Gray’s mom called the Georgia high school to warn that she’d received an alarming message from her troubled 14-year-old son.
Colt was already out of the room, allegedly loading the rifle he’d smuggled into school that day — but staff mistakenly raced to find his classmate Colton Gray, who was also out of the room, officials told WSB-TV.
“They were in the same classroom, and they sat beside each other,” Barrow County Sheriff Jud Smith said of the similarly named students, both 14.
Neither Colt Gray nor the other student were actually in the classroom when a school official went through the latter’s backpack, student Lyela Sayarath told the Washington Post of the confusing moments before the shooting unfolded.
Still, armed administrators were able to confront the shooter just one minute and six seconds after he opened fire, killing two students and two teachers, the sheriff said.
Just before the search, Colt Gray had asked to leave the room so he could go to the front office, Smith said.
“He asked to go up front and speak to someone at the front, and when you do that you take your belongings with you,” the sheriff explained.
The suspect was excused from class – and the school still had not idea that he had an AR-style rifle stashed in his backpack, the sheriff said.
“He brought it on his own,” Smith told WSB-TV. “It wasn’t hidden in the school, it wasn’t given to him by someone else.”
The teen was arrested and charged as an adult with four counts of felony murder.
