The 14-Year-Old Georgia Murder Suspect Will Be Tried as an Adult

Ten months earlier, he couldn’t have been held criminally responsible under the law. Does this make sense?

Jan M Flynn
4 min readSep 22, 2024
Image by Sergei Tokmakov, Esq. https://Terms.Law from Pixabay

The news hit with a gut punch. It always does

“Oh God, no,” I said. “Not again.”

But yes, again. On a Wednesday morning, just as kids all over the U.S. are reacclimating to a new school year, at a high school in Appalachee, Georgia the unthinkable happens.

No matter how often it happens, it’s always unthinkable.

This time, two teachers and two kids dead. Nine others in hospitals. Cable news videos of scenes that are sickening for their familiarity: a campus surrounded by police cars and emergency vehicles; the football field where students are herded to hopeful safety.

Frantic parents. Kids’ faces blank with horror. A new vortex of trauma radiating outward in a pall descending over the entire nation. Shock. Grief. Outrage.

Helplessness.

And fury. Fury that this is happening again. Kids and teachers mowed down in what should be — what used to be — the safe haven of a school campus.

Where do we direct that fury?

--

--

Jan M Flynn
Jan M Flynn

Written by Jan M Flynn

Writer & educator. The Startup, Writing Cooperative, P.S. I Love You, The Ascent, more. Award-winning short fiction. Visit me at www.JanMFlynn.net.