Multiple Law enforcement officials say that the high school at the center of today’s mass shooting in Georgia received an earlier phone threat.
Law enforcement officials in Georgia say Apalachee High School received a phone call this morning warning that there would be shootings at five schools and that Apalachee would be the first.
It is not known who placed the call. Officials say they are investigating the call and where it originated.
Lyela Sayarath, a junior at Apalachee High School, stated she was sitting next to suspected gunman Colt Gray moments before the deadly shooting occurred Wednesday.
She said Colt left the classroom at the beginning of their Algebra 1 class around 9:45 a.m. local time. Lyela thought Colt was going to the bathroom, but he didn’t take a pass, so she assumed he was skipping class, she said.
Toward the end of her Algebra class, Lyela said someone over the loudspeaker told her teacher to check her email.
Shortly after, Colt returned to the classroom outside of the shut door, which Lyela said locks automatically. She said a girl in the class went to open the door for him, but then jumped backwards after presumedly seeing that he had a gun.
“I guess he saw we weren’t going to let him in. And I guess the classroom next to me, their door was open so I think he just started shooting in the classroom,” Lyela said.
Lyela said the students in her classroom hid behind desks, as they heard the gunshots, which she described as “just one after another.”
“When we heard it, most people just dropped to the floor and like kind of crawled in an area like piled on top of each other,” she said. “The teacher turned off the lights, but we all just kind of piled together. And like I pushed desks in front of us.”
Lyela said her friend was in the classroom next to her, where the shooting was taking place.
“He was pretty shaken up,” she said of her friend. “He saw somebody get shot. He had blood on him. He was kinda limping. He looked horrified.”
Lyela described Colt as quiet and shy, and would only respond with single word answers when they worked as a group on projects together.