Inside the Georgia high school where a sleepy morning was pierced by gunfire
WINDER, Ga. — It was halfway through the second period Wednesday morning at Apalachee High Schooland the boy, whom few knew, slipped away from his algebra class at J Hall. His fellow students didn’t notice.
“He got up sometime in the morning and class was still going on,” Lyela Sayarath said. “He probably just skipped school.”
Many teenagers weren’t fully awake at Winder High School in rapidly urbanizing Barrow County. Junior Julie Sandoval dozed off in her science class while other students caught up on their work. Sophomore Jacob King also fell asleep in world history after a morning soccer practice.
But panic and fear soon set in when Colt Gray, the 14-year-old student who had left class, returned to the hallway with an assault rifle and opened fire. Four people were killed and nine others were wounded, seven of whom were shot, in the latest school shooting to shock the country.
Gray is charged with four counts of murder. Authorities have not yet said where he got the gun, how he got it onto campus or what he did with it in the two hours between the start of school at 8:15 a.m. and the time the first shots rang out around 10:20 a.m.
Law enforcement has not said whether Gray was wanted before the shooting. “We’re still trying to figure out a lot of the timeline,” Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Chris Hosey said Wednesday.
On Thursday, officers also arrested his father, Colin Gray, and charged him with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree murder and cruelty to children, for knowingly allowing his son to possess a weapon.
Alarms sounded at the school Wednesday morning when several teachers activated their portable panic buttons, which Sheriff Jud Smith said had only been distributed to staff a few days earlier. That triggered a lockdown, with alerts immediately flashing across smart boards in classrooms throughout the sprawling school.
“On the screen … it said ‘hard lockdown’ in big red letters and the top light started flashing,” said Layla Ferrell, a third-year student taking a nutrition class in another hall.
Many thought it was a drill. Schools in Georgia must complete at least one active shooter drill by October 1 each year.
“I thought it was fake until my friend told me it wasn’t fake,” King said. He added, “They didn’t really pretend it was real.”
Some heard what sounded like a loud metallic bang.
“It sounded more like hitting a locker at first,” Ferrell said.
But the people at J Hall had no doubts.
Sayarath said that when the suspect tried to return to class, a student saw what was described in the search warrants as a “black semi-automatic AR-15-style rifle” and refused to let him in. Classroom doors at the school lock automatically and must be opened from the inside, a “hardening” precaution in the American era of school shootings.
Kaylee Abner, a sophomore, said a student who left her geometry class to take a test elsewhere returned.
“She ran back inside, closed the door and then we heard three gunshots,” Abner said.
Junior Landon Culver caught a glimpse of the shooter after dropping out of Algebra II.
“I went outside to get water and I heard gunshots and bullets flying past my head,” Culver said. “It looked like he was wearing a black hoodie and had an AR and I didn’t really look around for long.”
Marques Coleman Jr. told The Washington Post that the gunman leaned in through an open door of his algebra classroom and opened fire, hitting people including Christian Angulo, who died. Others were shot in the hallway.
Senior Kassidy Reed was retaking an exam in a hallway when she heard gunshots from around the corner. A teacher told everyone to run.
“He helped us up and told us to run because our classroom door was closed and locked, so we couldn’t get in,” Reed said.
A teacher across the hall opened the door to her chemistry classroom and students rushed in. “I hid under a lab table,” Reed said.
Teachers turned off the lights and herded students into corners or behind desks. Classroom furniture became makeshift barricades.
“We put desks and chairs up against our door and built it up so no one could get in, and then we all just got quiet and waited,” Ferrell said.
Authorities said the suspect shot and killed students Angulo and Mason Schermerhorn, both 14, and teachers Richard Aspinwall, 39, and Cristina Irimie, 53. The nine who were wounded — eight students and a teacher — are expected to recover.
One of three school officers on campus quickly tracked down the shooter, who gave up and was arrested, the sheriff said.
Some students said they heard an officer shouting, ordering the shooter to stop and put down his weapon.
“I heard, ‘Get down! Get down! Don’t move!’ Reed said. Then there was a ‘shovel’ as the suspect was being handcuffed.
But the terror was not over yet.
Students said some students and teachers took off their clothes to stop the bleeding from the gunshot wounds.
Deputies searched classroom after classroom with guns drawn, looking for more wounded people and other possible shooters.
As the students gathered, they called and texted each other and their parents, more than a few sending what they feared would be goodbyes.
“I love you. I love you so much. Mom, I love you,” a tearful Sandoval texted. “I’m sorry I’m not the best daughter. I love you.”
Sandoval’s mother wrote back in Spanish that everything would be okay and that she should trust God.
“We started praying because we didn’t know if we were going to come out alive or not,” said Michelle Moncada, a freshman taking an art class.
Nearby, Sandoval said, another student was on the phone with his mother: “They’re shooting up the school! They’re shooting up the school!”
Abner held the hand of a boy who was praying.
“I just tried to think of positive things and nothing negative,” she said.
The hundreds of panicked parents who rushed to the school caused a traffic jam along the two-lane roads near Apalachee High. Many abandoned their cars and ran toward the campus.
Shannon Callahan, Ferrell’s mother, said her daughter texted her a photo of her under a table. “When the texts stopped, I was 100 percent concerned.”
During the evacuation, King saw the body of what appeared to be a student lying on the ground. “They blocked the body,” King said.
Abner also saw what appeared to be a female student who had been shot in the shoulder, leaning against a wall as emergency personnel attended to her.
Another student was lying on the ground, covering her eyes. Abner said, “I don’t know if she was dead, or shot or something, or if she was just processing it.”
Reed saw a gun on the ground, and blood.
As they fled, students left behind book bags, phones, and even shoes. Ferrell lost her rainbow Crocs and later made the long walk to her mother’s car in her socks.
Students gathered in the football stadium, crying and walking around.
“Everybody’s crying, everybody’s running around,” Moncada said. “They’re all running around trying to see who’s OK and who’s not.”
Early in the afternoon the students were handed over to their parents so they could go home.
Culver and others, however, said the sound of gunfire would stay with them forever.
“You could hear gunshots, like they were echoing through the school,” Culver said. “And you just wonder, which one of those two is someone you’re best friends with or someone you love?”
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Associated Press editor Charlotte Kramon contributed.