Apalachee school shooter was questioned for threats in 2023

A wreath at an Apalachee H.S. vigil in Winder

By Joe Johnson

The FBI in Atlanta and Jackson County Sheriff’s Office have released a joint statement about their response to tips of previous threats of a school shooting from the student who on Wednesday shot 13 people at Apalachee High School in Winder.

The statement said that in May 2023, the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center received several anonymous tips about online threats to commit a school shooting at an unidentified location and time. They said that the online threats contained photographs of guns.

The FBI said that within 24 hours, they determined the online post originated in Jackson County, Georgia and the FBI’s Atlanta Field Office referred the information to the local sheriff’s office for action. The Jackson County Sheriffs’ Office located a possible subject, a 13-year-old male, and interviewed him and his father.

That male was Colt Gray, the now 14-year-old who on Wednesday killed four people and injured nine at the Winder high school with an AR-15 assault rifle.

The statement said that Gray’s father stated he had hunting guns in the house, but that Gray did not have unsupervised access to them and that the subject denied making the threats online.

The statement said that authorities alerted local schools for continued monitoring of Gray.

“At that time, there was no probable cause for arrest or to take any additional law enforcement action on the local, state, or federal levels,” the statement said.

When Gray moved with his family to Barrow County, the information about the threats did not follow.