The 14-year-old who has been arrested in connection with a school shooting that left four dead in Georgia gave a chilling response to authorities after the attack.
On September 4, police were called to Apalachee High School in Winder, Barrow County over reports of an active shooter.
Two 14-year-old pupils - Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo - and two teachers, Christina Irimie and Richard Aspinwall, sadly died in the attack.
Seven others were injured after being shot, meanwhile a further two students suffered other injuries.
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A 14-year-old named Colt Gray was arrested on suspicion of the shooting, and is set to be tried as an adult.
One of Gray's classmates, Lyela Sayarath, told CNN that the teenager reportedly tried to come into a classroom she was in, when another student noticed he had a gun.
They didn't open the door - which was locked - with Sayarath claiming he then turned to another class.
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“I think he wanted to come to us first,” she said.
Meanwhile, another student, Macey Right, said: “I heard gunshots outside my classroom and people screaming, people begging not to get shot.
“And then people sitting beside me (were) just shaking and crying.”
According to CNN, Gray surrendered after he was confronted by a school resource officer.
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Barrow County Sheriff Jud Smith explained that after the teenager was arrested and taken into custody, Gray told investigators 'I did it' while being questioned.
It was later revealed the teenager had been interviewed back in May 2023 by the FBI after authorities received anonymous reports someone was making 'online threats to commit a school shooting at an unidentified location and time'.
Gray was interviewed, alongside his father, the BBC reports, but the teenager denied making the online threats and was subsequently not arrested at the time.
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The FBI said in a statement: "The father stated that he had hunting guns in the house, but the subject did not have unsupervised access to them [...] At the time, there was no probable cause for an arrest or to take any additional law enforcement action on the local, state or federal levels."
Following the teenager's arrest, his father has also been arrested by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, who took to Twitter yesterday (September 5) to reveal Colin Gray had been arrested 'in connection to the shooting at Apalachee High School' and charged with 'four counts of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of second-degree murder and eight counts of cruelty to children'.
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Lucy Devine