BARROW COUNTY, Ga. — Students at Apalachee High School walked out of the building Tuesday to demand school safety legislation.
The students held a four-minute moment of silence in honor of the four people killed during the school shooting in September. Students also are calling for legislative action.
Some of the students who survived the shooting joined lawmakers at the Georgia State Capitol on Tuesday morning.
[DOWNLOAD: Free WSB-TV News app for alerts as news breaks]
Channel 2′s Steve Gehlbach was at the Capitol, where they recalled the terrifying moments but also looked forward to what could be done to stop it from happening again.
“I sat there frozen, terrified, unable to move, unable to help. If I had moved, have tried, I might have been next,” Apalachee senior Isabel Trejo said.
On Monday, Georgia Speaker of the House Jon Burns introduced the Omnibus School Safety Bill, which includes a seven-point plan to stop school violence before it happens.
Among other things, Burns’ plan would create a school and student database operated by the Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency (GEMA) to collect and evaluate data to determine if a student may be a threat.
It would create threat assessment teams, build an anonymous threat reporting app for students, increase penalties for students making terroristic threats, and create tax incentives for buying safe gun storage devices and taking a gun safety course.
“We cannot only be reactive, we must be proactive. And that brings me to what is still missing from this plan. We cannot talk about school safety without talking about how firearms are stored,” Layla Renee Contreras with Change for Chee said.
RELATED STORIES:
- Apalachee school shooting: Colt Gray snuck gun into school in his backpack, sheriff says
- Apalachee school shooting: Colt Gray’s grandfather said his ‘environment’ drove him to shooting
- ‘I’m sorry:’ Mother of alleged Apalachee school shooter received cryptic texts from son that day
- Student honors teacher killed in Apalachee High School
On Sept. 4, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation says Colt Gray, 14, used a gun given to him by his father to open fire on classmates and teachers. Four people were killed: math teachers Ricky Aspinwall and Cristina Irimie and 14-year-old students Christian Angulo and Mason Schermerhorn. Nine other students and teachers were shot and injured.
Colt Gray and his father, Colin Gray, have both been indicted on murder charges.
Attorneys for Colin Gray filed a motion on Monday requesting bond.
[SIGN UP: WSB-TV Daily Headlines Newsletter]
©2025 Cox Media Group
