Colt Gray, the Georgia teenager who carried out a deadly shooting at Apalachee High School in September 2024, repeatedly asked his mother to search the internet for mentions of his name and bring him “fan art” drawings of himself during jail phone calls just weeks after the attack, according to testimony presented during his sentencing hearing.
Recordings of the jail phone calls played in court revealed that after the shooting killed four people, Gray communicated with his mother, Marcee Gray, asking her to search online within the “true crime community” for references to himself and his newfound notoriety. When she reported finding fan art of him, Gray expressed excitement about his status. In one recorded call, Gray told his mother, “I’m in the big leagues, bro. And not in a bad way.”
In another conversation, prosecutors said, Gray compared his online popularity to other infamous shooters, exclaiming, “Can you believe I’m more popular than Thomas Crooks?” referring to the man who attempted to assassinate Donald Trump in Pennsylvania in 2026. Gray’s mother responded approvingly in one call, referring to him as “a celebrity.”
The jail calls provided striking evidence of Gray’s apparent motive for the attack. Ashley Gilleland, an investigator with the Barrow County District Attorney’s Office, testified during the sentencing hearing that Gray carried out the shooting “to gain some sort of fame or notoriety from it.” The testimony came during the final day of a three-day sentencing hearing as the court weighed whether Gray should receive life in prison with or without the possibility of parole.
Gray, now 16, pleaded guilty on Friday to all 55 charges against him, including four counts of malice murder. He was just 14 years old when he took an AR-15-style rifle to Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, on September 4, 2024, and opened fire in a math classroom and hallway. Teachers Richard Aspinwall and Cristina Irimie were killed, along with students Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo. Nine others were wounded. Because Gray was 14 at the time of the shooting, he is not eligible for the death penalty.
Extensive evidence presented during the sentencing hearing revealed Gray’s deep and disturbing obsession with previous mass shooters, particularly Parkland school shooter Nikolas Cruz. Messages Gray wrote on the Discord communication platform showed his desire for infamy even before the attack. More than a year before the shooting, Gray wrote, “I wanna make history to put it short. I want people to remember the pain I caused and research me for hours.”
In messages read aloud in court, Gray also expressed his obsession with Cruz in deeply troubling terms. “My love for Nik has formed into something in which I can find no other resort that can prove my love and affection towards him,” he wrote days before the shooting. Gray had more than 2,600 photos of Cruz on his phone and searched extensively for information about the Parkland attack, including surveillance footage, autopsy photos, and Cruz’s death penalty trial.
Investigators testified that Gray had also studied other mass shootings, including the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting and the 2012 Aurora movie theater massacre. Gray staged his own appearance and computer to mimic other shooters, even dyeing his hair orange. His rifle contained writings and numbers that referenced other mass shooters and the online true crime community.
Prosecutors argued that Gray calculated his attack with precision, selecting September 4 as the date for reasons tied to his obsession with Cruz. Evidence showed Gray had left behind notebooks with detailed step-by-step instructions for the assault, including estimates that he could kill as many as 26 people and wound as many as 13 others.
Defense attorneys presented testimony from forensic psychologist Dr. Kevin Richards, who described Gray as a “lonely, dysfunctional kid” who grew up in severe chaos. Richards testified that Gray suffered from anxiety, depression, paranoia, and an unspecified personality disorder. He noted that Gray’s mother struggled with drug and alcohol addiction, the family moved repeatedly, and Gray experienced financial instability and neglect.
However, the psychologist acknowledged that while Gray’s troubled background was significant, it did not drive the shooting itself. Richards conceded that Gray planned the attack and that psychological intervention before the attack could have helped prevent it. He also acknowledged Gray had exaggerated some mental health symptoms and that he showed no evidence of schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or legal insanity.
Victim family members delivered emotional statements asking the judge for the maximum sentence. Mason Schermerhorn’s mother, Breanna Schermerhorn, told the court, “The failures of the adults around him may explain parts of his story, but they do not excuse the decisions that he made. Those decisions were his and his alone.”
Survivor Nautica Walton, who was shot in the leg, spoke of the lasting trauma. “I started to hate myself because I couldn’t truly live anymore, because I let you take every piece of joy I had away from me,” she said, addressing Gray directly. “I hate everything about you. I hate the scars you left on my body. I hate that you took innocent lives in front of innocent people.”
Gray is expected to have an opportunity to address the court before Superior Court Judge Nicholas Primm announces whether he will serve life in prison with or without the possibility of parole. The case comes amid broader accountability for parents of shooters. Gray’s father, Colin Gray, was convicted in March on murder and manslaughter charges for providing his son with the rifle and keeping it unsecured despite warnings that his son posed a danger to others. He faces decades in prison and is scheduled to be sentenced Thursday.