I'm more than a little bothered by this trend of prosecuting parents for the actions of their children. Anyone who has raised children is well aware that no matter what you do, they're going to do their own thing as they get older. The best you can do is hope you've given them the tools to make better choices than you probably made at that age.
Prosecuting the parents because that didn't happen, often despite their best efforts, is troubling.
Then there's this jackwagon, who might be one of the few examples who deserves it.
The jury has found Colin Gray, the man whose teenage son is accused of killing two students and two teachers in a shooting at Georgia's Apalachee High School, guilty of second-degree murder and all other charges.
On Tuesday, after just a few hours of deliberating and two weeks of witness testimony, the jury announced that they had come to a verdict.
Gray was charged with 29 counts, including second-degree murder, involuntary manslaughter, and cruelty to children. He had pleaded not guilty to all charges. Two of the charges had been dropped, leaving the jury finding him guilty of 27.
...Prosecutors argued that Colin Gray gave his son the weapon used in the shooting and ammunition despite multiple warning signs that the boy's mental state was deteriorating.
During closing arguments, the prosecution argued that Colin Gray was "one person who could have prevented" the mass shooting, pointing to signs that included multiple instances of violence in the years and months prior as well as what they called a "shrine" to [Parkland killer's name redacted], convicted of the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida.
"After seeing sign after sign of his son's deteriorating mental state, his violence, his school shooter obsession, the defendant had sufficient warning that his son was a bomb just waiting to go off," Barrow County Assistant District Attorney Patricia Brooks told jurors. "And instead of disarming him, he gave him the detonator."
Gray said he wanted to bond with his son at the gun range, which I get. I can even respect that. However, why in the hell would you give him access to a gun when he's got a freaking shrine to the Parkland killer?
Oh, and let's not forget this little tidbit:
In May 2023, the FBI showed up at his home because [the son] had allegedly been involved in a conversation on Discord about school shooters. Colin Gray said he took the visit from police seriously, but ultimately, police told him that many people were in the conversation and that they had traced an IP address to Russia or California. Colin Gray said the investigator told him not to give Colt Gray free access to guns.
I'm sorry, but if my kid is talking about school shootings, I'm going to listen when the FBI says to make sure he can't get a gun.
Of course, it's not a good thing that Gray was convicted before his son was. Imagine if he's rotting in prison, but for some reason, his son is acquitted. He's in prison for facilitating his son's access to guns to carry out a mass killing, only his son was found not guilty of that same massacre. It would be bizarre, to say the least.
Then again, I doubt that will happen. The evidence is pretty substantial, from what I can tell, and if they can convict the dad, they had to show a jury that the son was responsible for pulling the trigger to some degree, or so I'd imagine.
Yes, we're looking at this in hindsight, but on the same token, it's up to people like you and me to do our part to prevent things like this from happening. That includes keeping our guns locked up tight when the FBI tells us our kid, who has a shrine to a mass killer, is talking about school shootings in a Discord chat.
While I vehemently oppose any law that would try to dictate what we do with our guns, we need to have enough awareness of who our kids are, warts and all, before making a decision about their access to firearms. My son, at 14, was perfectly safe to have been given access to guns. He was responsible and respectful, and the only issues with violence at school were his fighting back against bullies.
My daughter, on the other hand, is about to turn 14 and isn't remotely ready for that kind of responsibility. She's not violent, just immature. So, she doesn't get the key to the gun safe.
We've got to step up and do our part to make sure things like this don't happen, if for no other reason than each such incident is used to justify some degree of gun control. No, we will not always be successful, but that doesn't mean we can't hold our community accountable.
I don't like them prosecuting parents, but when a parent is this oblivious to what his kid is up to, it's kind of hard to argue that he's just an innocent victim himself.
Editor's Note: The mainstream media continues to lie about gun owners and the Second Amendment.
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