By now, you’ve almost certainly heard about the horrible school shooting that took place in Winder, Georgia a few days ago. If you aren’t familiar with the details, a 14 year old boy took a gun to school and killed four people (two students and two faculty members) and injured nine others before being confronted by a school resource officer (law enforcement on campus) who he immediately surrendered to.
Just an awful situation, and one that no one should ever have to be made to go through.
In this case, the boy is being tried as an adult.
What you may not know is that the boy’s father has also been arrested and faces several charges. Jack Phillips writes,
Alleged Georgia school shooter Colt Gray and his father appeared in separate court hearings on Friday morning for the first time, two days after the incident unfolded at the Apalachee High School.
Phillips continues:
The boy’s father, Colin Gray, 54, also appeared in court on Friday after he was charged in connection with the shooting, including counts of involuntary manslaughter and second-degree murder.
During Friday’s court appearance, Colin Gray was told he would remain jailed without bond.
The father “knowingly allowed his son, Colt, to have the weapon,” the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said in a social media post on Thursday night.
So, what does this mean for you, if you are a parent who owns firearms?
First, it means that you shouldn’t allow a child to have access to a firearm before they are mature enough to handle it both physically and, also, on a maturity level with a full understanding of the consequences if they do something horrible with it.
It’s being reported that the shooter’s father gave the boy a gun for Christmas even though the boy and his father had been questioned by law enforcement earlier in that year for possibly making threats to shoot up a school. Would you have given your child a gun after being questioned for law enforcement about this kind of thing?
The second thing that this father’s arrest could mean for you is that you could be held responsible if your child accesses a firearm and does something horrible. So, you have to go above and beyond just casually looking out for your children. You have to be incredibly vigilant about making sure that they can’t access a firearm until they are old enough to know that they only acceptable uses for it are for practice at a range of some type, hunting in a responsible way, or in self-defense.
And, of course, you should be doing all of these things anyway to keep your kids safe and to shield them from doing something that could have consequences that they don’t even begin to understand at a young age.
You know, the basics of good parenting.
Still, in light of this tragedy, it’s a worthwhile reminder to keep your kids from having access to firearms until they really are mature enough for that responsibility. And not just for them, but because you could bear a share of the blame, too, if they do something horrible or stupid.