Cop Testifies About Apalachee School Shooter Colt Gray's Drawings & Interview

A sheriff's investigator detailed the case against teenage school shooter Colt Gray during the boy's sentencing hearing last week in Winder, Georgia. Jason Smith of the Barrow County Sheriff's Office testified on Friday (July 24). Smith investigated the Sept. 4, 2024, shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder that killed two teachers and two students. Gray pleaded guilty to all 55 charges against him without a deal with prosecutors. Judge Nicholas Primm will decide if he goes to prison for the rest of his life with no chance of parole, or if he'll have a chance of parole eventually. 02:59 "So that morning, on the video surveillance footage, you can see Colt come inside the classroom. He opens up his notebook. He stays in the classroom until approximately second period at Appalachee starts at 9:45 in the morning. So at approximately 9:54 hours, Colt Gray tells his teacher that he is going to go see a crisis counselor." 04:05 "When Colt Gray exits the bathroom, you can see him carrying his book back. The rifle is still partially concealed in it. He carries that down back down towards his second period class and attempts to make entry into this this second period class." 07:08 "At that point, Colt Gray opens fire on on Mason ..." "After he shoots Mason, what happens?" "At that point, Colt continues on down the hall to where he gets to. This is K Hall, and he points his rifle down, aiming it at a student by the name of Zane Zane. At this moment in time, this is when at this hall right here, this is F Hall, and this is when SROs Sergeant Donovan Boyd and Deputy King are coming down F Hall. They announce and give verbal commands to Colt to put down the rifle, and he does so." "And at that point, is he apprehended?" "Yes, ma'am." 08:29 "So when I first got there, I made entry into the school from a cafeteria entrance or an entrance near the cafeteria. I made contact with Sergeant Brett Maxwell and Deputy Greg Jones in the cafeteria area, I was informed that they believe they had one shooter in custody, but there was a suspicion that there may be a second shooter." 10:11 "Where did you take him in order to interview him?" "So we, after we started the evacuation process of J Hall, there was an open classroom nearby, 2.139, which is the last classroom, and it was the closest classroom to where Colt was at that time." "Approximately what time did you begin to interview him?" "I believe the interview started at 10:54 hours." "So that was approximately 30 minutes after the shooting?" "Yes, ma'am." 12:16 "We're going to play the interviews later, but before we get into those, I want to ask you a few specific questions about those interviews. During the interview at Apalachee High School, your first interview, did the defendant tell you where he found his rifle that he used in committing this crime?" "Yes, ma'am." 13:58 "Colt indicated that it was spontaneous, that it was a last-minute thing. That he came into school that morning, had heard voices, and that he just, on the way to get help, on the way to the crisis counselor, he just decided to to conduct the shooting." "Did he reiterate that lack of planning in the second interview as well?" "He did." 23:46 "Based on this drawing, does it appear that the second period class was in fact the target of the shooting?" "Yes, ma'am." 24:13 "Yes, ma'am. At the top of the page, there's some letters that are written below that states "Wow. I did not expect. If you further, if you look further down on the page, what kind of jumped out to me was the the sinister God. Here I am, prison." 28:08 "So he said that morning that he just grabbed whatever gun and whatever ammunition he could find..." 28:44 "during the interview, he just said that he grabbed whatever was available. He didn't indicate that he intended to bring a specific number of rounds or magazines or anything like that." 29:04 "are these drawings accurate as to what, or close to accurate as to what magazines he ultimately brought?" "Yes, ma'am. Three of the four are accurate." 30:48 "what kind of jumped out to me about this one is on whichever day Colt made this prior to September 4th, he appears to document that there were empty seats in the classroom on this specific day." 33:36 "Yes, ma'am. This is where he repeatedly wrote the word "why" over 100 times. Down at the bottom, he kind of writes out a sentence. Why am I like this? Again, he writes the word "why" repeatedly. I think this was over 20 times. Again, on this page, Colt again writes the word "why" approximately 100 times.