New difficult test for parental responsibility in Georgia shooting case

The murder charge against the father of a school shooter has set new standards in the question of parental responsibility.

Colin Gray bought his son Colt an AR rifle for Christmas last year, even though the boy had been questioned by police just seven months earlier for making online threats to commit a school shooting.

Investigators suspect the 14-year-old may have used the same weapon when he shot four people and injured nine others at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia on Wednesday.

The teenager has now been charged with murder and – in an unprecedented move – his father has also been charged.

Gray, 54, is charged with two counts of premeditated murder, four counts of manslaughter and eight counts of child abuse.

Together, these charges carry a maximum sentence of 180 years in prison.

Can they enforce the charges?

The murder charge against Mr. Gray is based on his “knowingly allowing his son to possess a firearm,” said Chris Hosey, director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

The two charges relate to the two teenagers killed in Wednesday's shooting: Christian Angulo and Mason Schermerhorn, both 14 years old.

Two teachers from Apalachee were also killed in the attack – 39-year-old Richard Aspinwall and 53-year-old Cristina Irimie.

Mr. Gray is facing a second-degree charge, which may be due to specific language in Georgia state law.

According to the state's penal code, someone commits second-degree murder “if, in the commission of cruelty to children in the second degree, he or she causes the death of another human being without malice or malicious intent.”

Prosecutors filed the charges just over 24 hours after the shooting, and experts say the facts are not yet fully established and it is unclear what legal arguments will be made against Mr. Gray.

“There is a connection between the deaths and 'cruelty to children,'” said Evan Bernick, associate professor of law at Northern Illinois University.

“But is the cruelty a direct result of the shooting, or is it the cruelty towards his son that might have led to [the boy] to commit the shooting? We just don't know yet.”

The son is being tried as an adult, meaning that the manslaughter prosecution will be treated in court as if he were fully responsible for his actions.

However, that does not mean his father will escape punishment, Professor Bernick told the BBC.

The core of the argument will not be that Colin Gray wanted the shooting, but that he “failed to intervene and his failure to do so was negligent in a way that justifies considering him as complicit in the murder.”

If he didn't pull the trigger, why is it a murder case?

Throughout the United States, there are laws that punish parents or guardians for everything from skipping school and driving while underage to shoplifting and vandalism.

But prosecutors in Michigan expanded the reach of such laws earlier this year when they secured a double conviction for the parents of another teenage shooter.

James and Jennifer Crumbley were found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to at least 10 years in prison for their criminal negligence as parents that contributed to their 14-year-old son Ethan killing four of his classmates in 2018.

Thursday's decision to charge the father with murder – a far more serious charge – could once again test the legal limits of parental responsibility.

Eve Brank, a psychology professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, studies how the law intervenes in and sometimes disrupts family decision-making.

In their view, the emerging idea of ​​punishing parents after school shootings reflects a general frustration with gun violence in the United States and the inability to stop the never-ending series of gun incidents in the country in the absence of regulatory reforms.

“It's not like we've created a lot of new laws to address these problems. They're just being used in a somewhat creative way to address the problem,” she said.

“Most people would agree, based on research, that children's behavior is influenced by many factors, not just parents.”

However, she noted that prosecutors in Georgia may have information from the investigation that is not yet available to the public, and so may believe they can successfully argue that Colin Gray's actions – like those of the Crumbleys before him – were particularly egregious.

Tim Carey, legal and policy adviser at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions, argues that charging parents is also a sign of weak gun safety policy.

Georgia is “very skeptical” of gun violence prevention policies, he said, and prosecutors in such states may “feel limited in trying to pursue justice or retribution after the fact, in part because they could not prevent such a tragedy.”

Where could the punishment of parents end?

Some legal scholars fear that expanding the tools available to prosecutors after a shooting could have unintended consequences.

“We know we have a violence and gun problem in our society,” said Ekow Yankah, professor of law and philosophy at the University of Michigan.

“And instead of tackling it with systematic and regulatory means, we appease ourselves with these extraordinary prosecutions.”

But Professor Yankah warns that prosecutors are now armed with a “hammer” that could also hit other people, including poor minority families and single parents.

“School shootings are very visible … but I worry about the cases that don't make the news,” he said.

And while parents today face greater risk of punishment for their children's violent acts, less progress has been made in making firearms more widely available and providing resources for mental health care for children in need.

“Our standard response to very profound social problems in the United States is to introduce the criminal justice apparatus,” said Professor Bernick.