Evelyn Duarte, contributor

CW: School-related gun violence

On the morning of Wednesday, Aug. 4, Colt Gray, a freshman at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, opened fire at 10:30 a.m. He killed two teachers, two students and injured nine others. Details about Gray were released stating that the FBI had both him and his father, Colin Gray, on the radar since last year after someone on a gaming app threatened to shoot up a middle school, according to an article from CBS News. They believed Colt may have been involved, but did not make those threats directly. 

According to an article from Fox News, The Jackson County Sheriff’s Office recently interviewed Colt’s father who claimed to possess guns in the house that were accessible but weren’t loaded. He said that he and his son would go out hunting and shooting together, and Colt even shot his first deer this year. This newfound evidence brought the arrest of Colin Gray who had claimed to know that his son carried an assault weapon with him that morning.

With the intervention of the FBI, they should have kept him at arm’s length from any school because sooner or later he would have been a threat. This tragedy could have been prevented if he had been sent to homeschool or online school. This happens countless times when kids, just like Colt Gray, make these threats and nothing gets done other than a simple visit from the authorities. Whatever happened to keeping our kids safe?  

Currently, 14-year-old Colt Gray is being charged as an adult and faces four counts of felony murder and could face life in prison if convicted by a jury. His father is also being charged with enabling his son’s access to a rifle, two counts of felony murder in the second degree, four counts of felony involuntary manslaughter and eight counts of felony cruelty to children in the second degree. Has anything else been done? No and we need proactivity, not thoughts and prayers.

There have also been increased threats of further gun violence, especially on social media. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation released a statement on Sept. 6 after the shooting at Apalachee High School and the recent threats online, saying how any threats will be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and any reposts will be considered spreading false information, but who’s to say if they follow through. Nothing will change because authorities chose not to look at every aspect of these threats. Perhaps some of these threats are false, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. Today’s society is so centered on social networking that it’s hard to decipher what is true or false, but when it comes to one or multiple lives that should raise concern. The system needs to do better to protect it because, at the end of the day, history will keep repeating itself.

The recent events at Apalachee High School have left the United States in fear. School is supposed to be viewed as a place where it keeps kids safe, but nowadays parents are afraid to send their children off to school, let alone kids not wanting to go to school themselves. They have to constantly look over their shoulders because they don’t feel safe. The world is falling apart as we know it and this is just one of the many things going on. Wake up America, this is our future.