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***Update: A Georgia jury has found Colin Gray, father of Apalachee High School shooting suspect Colt Gray, guilty of all charges, including second-degree murder. Learn more HERE***
Since the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School, the United States has endured 84 mass shootings at schools. Each one is its own nightmare. And after each one, the pattern feels painfully familiar: grief, political finger-pointing, promises. And then gridlock.
But a recent 60 Minutes report highlighted something different. In a handful of cases, prosecutors aren’t just charging the shooter. They’re charging the parents.
The most prominent example came out of Oxford, Michigan. In 2021, a 15-year-old opened fire at Oxford High School, killing four students. He later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison. But prosecutors went further, arguing his parents ignored glaring warning signs, failed to secure the firearm, and bought the handgun used in the attack just days before the shooting.
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Both parents were convicted of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to at least 10 years in prison—the first time in U.S. history parents were held criminally responsible for a mass school shooting carried out by their child.
Now, in Georgia, the father of a teen accused of a 2024 school shooting is on trial under a similar theory: that red flags were missed, warnings ignored, and responsibility abdicated.
So here’s the uncomfortable question: Where does accountability begin and end?
In the Oxford case, there were documented warning signs. Teachers flagged disturbing behavior. The student reportedly wrote violent messages and drew graphic images just hours before the attack. His parents were called in. They declined to take him home. The backpack was never searched.
But critics argue the school itself fumbled its response. An independent review later concluded the tragedy was avoidable. Lawsuits against the district were dismissed under Michigan’s government immunity laws.
That raises another question: Why are parents criminally liable but institutions often aren’t?
Researchers cited in the report found that over 90% of school shooters broadcast their plans in advance. Most were in crisis. Many had experienced neglect, trauma, or instability. According to criminologists who’ve interviewed mass shooters directly, nearly all said someone could have stopped them.
The debate now centers on prevention. Is prosecuting parents a meaningful deterrent or simply the only lever prosecutors have left to pull? Does it create stronger gun storage practices and parental vigilance? Or does it risk criminalizing tragedy?
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And what about mental health funding? A bipartisan bill after Uvalde allocated $1 billion for school mental health grants. Most of that funding was later discontinued.
So here we are.
Gun-related violence remains a leading cause of death among minors in America (mostly due to gangs and drugs). Security theater—metal detectors, clear backpacks, drills—may make adults feel proactive. But data suggests early intervention, threat assessment teams, and school-based mental health support are far more effective.
Still, the core question remains:
If a parent ignores clear warning signs and gives a troubled teen access to a firearm, should they face prison time? If schools fail to follow their own protocols, should they face liability too? Is this about justice or about trying to break a cycle no one seems able to stop?
We’ll ask it plainly:
Should parents of school shooters be prosecuted? And if so, where do we draw the line?
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is a seasoned outdoorsman, lifelong hunter, and the kind of guy who’d rather track whitetails than scroll social media. As an editor for GunsAmerica, he’s got a sharp eye for spotting both solid gear and bad gun laws. Whether he’s deep in the woods or deep in editorial deadlines, Larry brings a no-nonsense, tell-it-like-it-is approach to firearms, hunting, and the great American tradition of self-reliance. If there’s a hot debate on gun rights or the latest in hunting tech, you can bet Larry’s got an opinion—and it’s probably backed up with both facts and field experience.
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Oh, and on the school being responsible versus the parents. This crap started when all you parents out there didn’t want teachers to discipline your child. Now your child can run his mouth and do and say anything they want without fear of getting in trouble especially when they have hands off parents. You asked for it you got it…
Bad and disturbing behavior was reported to the parents and they declined to take him home… Bah-bye, see you in 10 years!
To tell you the truth I don’t give a shit if parents notice there’s a problem with their kid or not. There’s no philosophy involved in this and there’s no “maturity level“ a kid needs to reach or has been proven to have reached by their parents.
The fact that they purchased their child a gun and allowed them to have access to it or one owned by the parents is enough for me. It’s irresponsible parenting and we’re not talking about the kid having access to dad’s beer… We’re talking about a gun that the child is too young to legally purchase on their own in the first place.
There should be a federal law all states have to abide by and that is the minimum age of 18 to purchase guns/ammo and 21 for handguns.
Its an interesting concept. On one hand, parents who notice things could be held to a standard while parents who didn’t notice things should have? It sort of places the parents in the middle. Are parents to be responsible enough to know when their child is having a mental health crisis and act upon it? If that is the case, then it should be that parents are responsible for all mental health concerns and should not be penalized by the state for acting upon it. A case in point, transgender kids getting proper healthcare. Mental health care check. Parents getting their child help check. State allowing parents to get help for their transgender kids, well some states allow it and some states don’t. So the states that don’t shouldn’t go after parents for other mental health issues. And those states that do allow parents to act on mental health issues should also go after parents who don’t do anything about their kids mental health issues. That’s fair right?
Should parents of school shooters be prosecuted? Yes and no. First, if evidence indicates that there is probable cause that the parent(s) possible negligence contributed to the shooting, then yes, they should have their day in court. If the parent did everything possible to prevent said shooter from accessing firearms and the shooter still went on a rampage, then I would expect they wouldn’t be prosecuted.
Every instance of a shooting must be investigated as a single incident. Every effort must be made to reveal all the facts of the case. Is there probable cause to believe that a parent had every chance to stop a shooting but was either too stupid or just plain negligent in their parental responsibilities? Or, the parent had a secure storage container for all of their firearms in their possession that was locked up at all times with any lock combination or keys secured to prevent access?
Kids can be very devious. If they are determined to get a firearm and they can’t get one at home, they’ll try to get one outside of the home. At which point the entire system better be on top of their game.
In every case that I’ve familiar with, there were indications of problems that required intervention. In every one of those cases, had the parents, schools, law enforcement, friends or whomever, been alert, tragedy could have been avoided.
In my humble opinion, there is no foolproof means to stop 100% of shootings. Even in countries that have banned firearm ownership, assaults still happen.
We are, after all, just human.
quote—————–Now, in Georgia, the father of a teen accused of a 2024 school shooting is on trial under a similar theory: that red flags were missed, warnings ignored, and responsibility abdicated.————quote
He was rightly and justly convicted today and they are saying he is going to get at least 25 years in the pen. He deserves every year of it.
Its about time we hold irresponsible parents accountable for their actions which allow kids to get their hands on deadly weapons especially if they are problem children with known prior acts of making threats or having engaged in violence.
When the rest of these deadbeat parents see other deadbeat parents getting long prison sentence it will sink into their thick skulls that letting deadly weapons just lie around the house is going to get them into big trouble.
well they don’t go after the ghetto rat’s parents so why go after the school shooter’s parents.
Often those parents are absent. And in some cases, already in prison.
thats exactly what they want you to believe.
quote————————-thats exactly what they want you to believe.—————quote
Who does?????????
your masters!
Another one of your racist statements. Do you think they will also not be prosecuted and go to prison. Really Paul what kind of planet do you live on anyway that you believe the law will just let them off the hook????
uh, that would be planet reality where the sky don’t fall, people get murdered daily, the criminals are put back on the streets as soon as possible, politicians own their constituent’s very lives and live like kings, and the police are arrested more than the criminals just for doing their jobs! we affectionately refer to here as shit-hole cleveland!
quote—————and the police are arrested more than the criminals just for doing their jobs———-
Yeah, sure Paul like when the cops killed a 12 year old kid Tamir Rice with an air soft replica. They gunned him down the second they jumped out to the patrol car.
Or how about last year when eight Akron, Ohio Cops shot a kid, Jayland Walker 90 times as he lay dying in the street. They shoot rabid dogs with less ammo,
Or when Akron Police last year gunned down unarmed Corey Phillips with seconds after arriving on the scene.
I could give more outrageous murders by police, but I am sure you would just shrug them off with the simple wave of the hand until of course you someday one of your relatives get gunned down unjustly and of course unarmed. Then you will be dancing to a different tune.
Try again Paul you never cease to make a fool of yourself, and you even live in the areas I mentioned.
just more of your twisted AI nonsense! all officers were cleared of all charges by the local and federal depts of justice, which is hard in democrat strongholds, so whats your point beyond the obvious bullshit your masters like to spout to create controversy!
quote——————just more of your twisted AI nonsense! all officers were cleared of all charges by the local and federal depts of justice, which is hard in democrat strongholds, so whats your point beyond the obvious bullshit your masters like to spout to create controversy!———–quote
Not exactly except in the 90 shot incident all the other cops in the other two incidents were fired. Once that happens they are also open to civil lawsuits even if they excaped murder convictions. And usually their carreers in law enforcement are over. The cop who shot the 12 year old kid tried twiced to get a job in other juristictions but was caught lying on his application and then fired again.
In our corrupt America it is very hard to get a conviction on a Cop as all they have to do is say “I feared for my life” and a jury will always give the benefit of the doubt to the murderous cop. Its only when there is graphic video evidence that a cop goes to prison. The George Flyod murder was so graphic it was shown around the world and without it the mad dog cop Derrick Chauvin would have walked free.
The video a couple of years ago of a cop that went to prison for shooting a fleeing man in the back and killing him over nothing more than a burned out license plate bulb would never have happened if a bystander had not turned in his cell phone video of the incident and the prosecuter admitted he could never have gotten a conviction without it.
And I also forgot to mention that in Cleveland a Rookie cop and a Veteren Cop was chasing a man and the Veteren mad dog cop told the Rookie to “Shoot the bastard”. The Rookie Cop missed and the bullet went through a house and the bullet killed a baby in his Fathers arms. The list goes on and on,
On average mad dog murderous U,S. Cops murder 1,500 people a year compared to say in 2012 China with a bigger population than the U.S. killed only 4 people by Cop and Germany only killed 12 people by cops. Positivbe proof that the U,S. “is not” a civilized country.
And by the way Paul, you Moron none of the Cop murders had anything to do with A.I. They were all over the news and you claim you live in Cleveland so I know you were aware of those shootings.
I guess you people of the Far Right now have another whipping boy to use when you disagree with reality or even science.
dacian thinks dacian read minds like dacian did with Ashli Babbit where dacian determined that the Air Force veteran was guilty of thought crime and her death was justified in dacian’s bizarre mind. dacian wanted to have the LEO, Lt. Byrd, awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor even though Bryd had a sullied past.
dacian was a gun toting 14-year-old soaking in “White privilege.” At 77 years old dacian is NOT very mature so I wonder why anyone would allow the 14-year-old version dacian access to firearms? dacian will never explain all the incongruities dacian generates on this MB.
Remember all that dacian?
:^I
to Kane
quote————Remember all that dacian?——–quote
You are still on your Ashley Babbitt rant about her being some sort of martyr. Sorry Kane , even her own Husband told her she should not have gone and what might happen to her. The Man who shot her was doing his job trying to keep an out of control vicious mob from murdering both Republicans and Democrats. Many were caught and found to be armed. They were all shouting that they were going to murder Republicans and Democrats, yet you ignore the facts Kane. Why Kane, because you supported the violent overthrow of a legally elected government and believe the Trump propaganda that the election was stolen despite at least 5 Republican investigations that proved otherwise. Get you head out of Steve Bannon’s rectum and watch some accredited news outlets.
quote————-dacian was a gun toting 14-year-old soaking in “White privilege.” At 77 years old dacian is NOT very mature so I wonder why anyone would allow the 14-year-old version dacian access to firearms? dacian will never explain all the incongruities dacian generates on this MB.————quote
How many times do we have to go through this Kane. You were not alive during the 1950’s in American History. The average kid back in my day all had a BB gun by age 12 and a shotgun by age 14 and some even had .22 pistols and .22 rifles. Yet we fought each other with fists not with firearms even though we all had them.
Back then a man made enough money so his wife could stay home and care for the children and raise them properly. Back then divorce was actually quite rare. At my grade school in the 1950’s there were very few kids who came from divorced homes. Very few.
Today things have changed very much. We have had the breakdown of family life and divorce rates are 50% or more depending on the city or area of the country. Many parents are on drugs. I remember an incident when the cops were called because of two parents in a car with their 2 kids had passed out from an overdose on drugs. Even today this shocked many people. We live in a different world today and today parents must keep deadly weapons locked up and out of the reach of children. None of my children had access to firearms, not because they had problems but because any of their friends who came over to play might have found a loaded gun and shot themselves with it.
When the working man’s wages stagnated for over 50 years while the rich became fabulously wealthy while working men’s wives were forced to go into the workforce and the family still could not make the bills and the children often came home to an empty house after school. Drug addiction exploded both with parents and with their children. When you add the toxic mix of accessible firearms it’s like lighting match to a railroad car full of dynamite.
People like you Kane will never know what it was like to live in an America that was peaceful without shootouts every day, without out of control drug addiction, with two political parties that did not threaten constantly to kill each other and never cooperate with each other and where racism was not promoted by the top people in Government which today further fans the flames of racist hatreds that Trump has promoted. Trump will go down in History as the worst President ever to infest the Office and who went all out to destroy our Democracy ,establish a dictatorship and destroy our Constitution. All great Nations eventually fail and whether the U.S. will survive Herr Drumpf and his gang of racist Stormtroopers time will only reveal.
Herr Drumpfs latest “diversion” from the Epstein Files was to start another war in the Middle East that has now spread to other countries. The Ukraine is now doubly vulnerable to Putin’s onslaught as we have used up many more times the missiles we previously and miserly gave to Ukraine to defend itself with. China is seriously considering invading Taiwan with the U.S. Navy now spread dangerously thin all over the globe. Nato has been seriously weakened by Trump’s threats against Greenland much to the delight of Putin who now has his sights set not only on Ukraine but all of Eastern Europe.
Even some of Trump’s most ardent supporters (the ignorant Maga Fanatics) have deserted him after he stabbed even his radical base in the back by Ignoring the U.S. and throwing all the people to the economic wolf. Gas prices are soaring, food prices are bankrupting people, the Criminal Republicans took billions in health care away from the American people by destroying the Obamacare extensions, consumer goods prices are becoming unaffordable to the average American due to Trump’s ridiculous Tariff’s which only the consumer was required to pay, not the Foreign Governments, not the greed monger Importers, and not the U.S. Government.