Georgia school shooting suspect hid long gun in poster board on school bus, agent says
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(GEORGIA) — When 14-year-old Colt Gray rode the bus to his Georgia high school on the morning of Sept. 4, he had a long gun hidden in a poster board that looked like a school project, surveillance video showed, a state agent said in court Wednesday.
Colt Gray is accused of killing two students and two teachers, and injuring several others, at Apalachee High School that day.
A George Bureau of Investigation (GBI) agent who had viewed surveillance footage from the bus and the school appeared in a Barrow County courtroom on Wednesday to describe what the videos captured during a probable cause hearing in the case against Colt Gray’s father, Colin Gray.
On the morning of the shooting, Colt Gray left a notebook on his desk in math class, went to the bathroom with his backpack and came out of the bathroom with gloves on and the poster board in front of him, appearing to hide the AR-15-style rifle, the GBI agent said.
Colt Gray knocked on the door of his math class to go back in, and a classmate went to open the door, the agent said. But the classmate saw Colt Gray through the door window, backed up, put her hand over her mouth and told the teacher, the agent said. The teacher went to the door window, told students to get into the corner and initiated a lockdown, the agent said.
The 14-year-old suspect allegedly entered another classroom and started shooting, the agent said. About six or seven people were shot during the approximately seven seconds the gunman was inside the room.
Colt Gray then ran back toward the bathrooms, and at 10:22 a.m. he allegedly aimed his rifle at a teacher and fired multiple shots, the agent said. The teen then turned toward another hallway and shot two coaches, the agent said. A student then came out of a bathroom and was shot and killed.
Two school resource officers entered the hallway and ordered the 14-year-old to put his rifle down and surrender, the agent said.
The notebook Colt Gray allegedly left on his desk contained a plan on how to execute the shooting, an estimated possible casualty count and sketches of his classroom, according to the agent.
Colt Gray was arrested on murder charges while Colin Gray is charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of second-degree murder and eight counts of cruelty to children. Colin Gray is accused of knowingly allowing his son to possess the weapon used in the shooting, according to the GBI.
Teen believed to be armed stopped from entering Wisconsin elementary school. Via Kenosha Police Department
(KENOSHA, Wis.) — Several replica guns have been recovered from the home of a 13-year-old who allegedly planned to scare students at a Wisconsin elementary school, but was stopped from entering the building, according to police.
The 13-year-old tried to enter his former school, Roosevelt Elementary School, around 9 a.m. Thursday, carrying a backpack and duffel bag, Kenosha police said.
The teen attempted to enter through other doors, but was not able to get in, Kenosha Unified School District Superintendent Jeffrey Weiss told reporters. He then approached the front entrance and was buzzed into a vestibule area. Two school employees confronted the student, who got nervous and then fled, Weiss said.
The suspect, who was taken into custody at his home on Thursday, has been charged with one count of terroristic threats, Kenosha police said.
In a search at the suspect’s home, police said they discovered several air soft replica handguns and a replica rifle.
No real guns were found, police said, and the suspect’s mother told authorities the teen doesn’t have access to guns.
The suspect told police he went to the school that day to sell candy, police said. The teen “later told a social worker that he went to the school with the intent to scare students,” police said in a statement.
The teen is expected to make his first court appearance on Friday, police said.
Police said the suspect looked up school shootings online and made comments to fellow students for weeks leading up to the incident.
“We narrowly missed a tragedy,” Kenosha Police Chief Patrick Patton told reporters at a news conference on Thursday, before police determined the guns were not real.
“I can’t stress … really how heroic our office staff was,” Weiss said, adding, “They helped avert a disaster.”
Kenosha is located about 40 miles south of Milwaukee.
(NEW YORK) — Schools in the U.S. remain deeply divided along racial, ethnic and economic lines, even as studies show that the K-12 public school population is becoming more diverse.
More than a third of students attend schools where 75% or more of those in attendance are of a single race or ethnicity, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s most recent investigation into K-12 education.
Saba Bireda and Ary Amerikaner co-founded Brown’s Promise, an initiative to combat racial segregation and honor the legacy of nine Arkansas students who suffered because of it.
In 1954, the Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision ruled that public school segregation was unconstitutional. Three years later, the NAACP attempted to enroll nine black students at Little Rock Central High School. The ensuing chaos gripped the nation, with the media dubbing the students “Little Rock Nine.”
Then-Gov. Orval Faubus prevented the students from entering the racially segregated school, using his state’s National Guard for help. President Dwight D. Eisenhower intervened after weeks of failed attempts to get the students through a full day of classes safely.
Following the Brown v. Board of Education decision, students started getting bused into schools from different neighborhoods to promote integration. However, much of that has stopped in the decades since.
“Unfortunately, we have come away from our commitment to the spirit of Brown,” Bireda said. “Schools have been resegregating rapidly since the 1980s.”
At the start of that decade, expensive busing orders began to expire. With a history of housing discrimination leading many neighborhoods to be segregated by race, for millions of students, attending the public school closest to their home means it wouldn’t be racially diverse.
Despite the billions of dollars invested in desegregating public schools over the past few decades, school segregation has returned to the same level as it was in the 1960s.
New York high school student Ava Pittman begins her daily commute by taking the public bus, just like millions of other students. However, her journey through the city’s Queens borough starts long before first period — shortly after dawn breaks.
Every morning, Pittman makes the 14-mile, hour-and-a-half journey from the Far Rockaway neighborhood to Metropolitan Expeditionary Learning School in Elmhurst. She travels that far because she doesn’t think the schools near her are up to par.
“Schools in certain places like Far Rockaway, the resources are minimal,” Pittman said. “It’s just the quality of education. It’s different.”
Pittman’s opportunities are unique to her location, but the commute takes up most of her day. To her, it’s worth it because of everything she gets to do in that school.
“I co-founded an affinity group called BAM, which is ‘Black at Mel’s.’ ” Pittman said. “I’m also part of a group called ‘The Education Student Advisory Council.’ My speech and debate team is the most diverse in our league, [which is] the Brooklyn Queens Forensic League.”
According to data collected by the Department of Education between 2022 and 2023, among 100,000 public schools across the country, about 83% of all Black public school students and 82% of all Latino students attended a majority non-white school. At the same time, 75% of all white public school students were enrolled in a majority-white school.
At a recent conference in Baltimore, Bireda and Amerikaner met with education leaders to discuss solutions.
“We talk a lot about the importance of full integration to the health of our democracy,” Bireda said. “Students who continually are growing up in segregated environments or not interacting with people from different backgrounds.”
Even at a young age, Pittman advocates for diversity and integration in public schools. She is a youth advocacy director at Integrate NYC, a youth-led organization dedicated to created equity in New York City schools.
According to the Civil Rights Project, New York is one of the most diverse states in the nation. Despite this, it is one of the most segregated.
In a lawsuit against the state, Integrate NYC alleges that the city’s sorting and admission process forces students of color into the most overcrowded and under-resourced schools.
“We agree with plaintiffs that achieving those educational goals is made harder by the complex system of biases and inequities deeply rooted in this country’s history, culture, and institutions — a system that we also want to change,” the New York City Department of Education said in a statement sent to ABC News. “But this lawsuit is not the answer. We are prepared to defend against these claims in court.”
Unless something is done to improve school integration, Pittman and thousands of other students across the country will have to keep fighting for their education and the opportunities that come with it.
(NEW YORK) — A Minnesota man faces multiple charges for allegedly driving while intoxicated and crashing his vehicle into a restaurant patio, killing two people and injuring nine others, officials said Tuesday.
Steven Frane Bailey, 56, was charged Tuesday with two counts of criminal vehicular homicide for intoxication and negligence, as well as nine counts of criminal vehicular operation for the injured victims, the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office said.
The incident occurred Sunday evening when authorities say a man drove into the patio area of the Park Tavern in St. Louis Park around 8 p.m. local time.
“According to the criminal complaint, Bailey was observed on surveillance video pulling into the Park Tavern parking lot Sunday, driving past an open parking spot, hitting a parked car when he tried to back into that spot, pulling out and then accelerating toward the patio,” the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office said in a press release. “He plowed through the metal fence into the patio seating area and hit several people.”
Several people seated or walking in the patio area were struck, according to the complaint, which alleged that Bailey continued to accelerate, reaching speeds of 30 to 45 mph, before finally coming to an “abrupt and violent halt” upon hitting several boulders at the base of a hill.
Officers who approached Bailey’s vehicle allegedly heard him on the phone saying, “I hit the gas instead of the brake and went right through a thing” and “I’m probably going to jail,” according to the complaint.
Bailey’s speech was slurred, and his eyes were bloodshot and watery, according to the complaint. He was unsteady on his feet upon exiting the vehicle, and when told by officers that they were going to perform field sobriety tests, he allegedly responded, “You don’t need to do fields. I know what I did,” the complaint stated.
He was transported to a hospital, where a preliminary breath sample showed a BAC of .325, according to the complaint. Results of a blood kit test were pending as of Tuesday, the complaint stated.
Bailey was booked into the Hennepin County Jail following a medical evaluation. He is scheduled to make his first court appearance Wednesday afternoon. It is unclear if he has an attorney.
“Bailey could have simply decided to stay home or take a Lyft rather than driving while intoxicated,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said in a statement. “This tragedy killed two people and injured several others, and it was entirely avoidable. We extend our deepest sympathy to the families of those killed, everyone injured, and the entire close-knit St. Louis Park community as they grieve this devastating incident.”
The attorney’s office identified the victims killed in the crash as Kristina Folkerts, a mother of three who worked at the restaurant, and Gabe Harvey, who was celebrating with several co-workers from Methodist Hospital at the time.
Folkerts was pinned under the vehicle and died at the scene despite life-saving efforts after officers lifted the vehicle off of her, prosecutors said. Harvey was transferred to a local hospital, where he died, prosecutors said.
One of the victims is currently unconscious and intubated at a hospital after sustaining broken legs, a broken pelvis, broken ribs and dislocated knees, according to the complaint.
Other victims suffered injuries, including head trauma, “serious” road rash and bruises, according to the complaint.
A memorial to the victims has been set up outside the Park Tavern, which is scheduled to reopen Wednesday in the wake of the crash.
The St. Louis Park Police Department believes more people were injured in the crash, and the number of charges against Bailey could increase if additional victims come forward, the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office said.
Bailey has two prior DWI convictions, including for gross misdemeanor third-degree DWI in 2015 and misdemeanor fourth-degree DWI in 2014, according to the attorney’s office.
