The 14-year-old boy suspected of shooting and killing four people at a high school in Georgia will not face the death penalty.
Colt Gray appeared at a court hearing on Friday, a day after his father was arrested for allowing his son to have a weapon.
He was called back into the courtroom after he had been escorted out in shackles for the judge to correct an earlier misstatement that his crimes could be punishable by death.
The judge said because he is a juvenile the maximum sentence he could face is life without parole.
Gray is accused of using a semiautomatic assault-style rifle to kill two students and two teachers at Apalachee High School in the city of Winder, outside Atlanta.
One teacher and eight students were also injured in the attack on Wednesday, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said. They are expected to make a full recovery.
Gray was charged as an adult with four counts of murder in the deaths of Mason Schermerhorn and Christian Angulo, both 14, Richard Aspinwall, 39, and Christina Irimie, 53.
His lawyer declined to seek bail at the court hearing.
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Father’s charges ‘directly connected with actions of his son’
Arrest warrants said he caused the deaths of others “by providing a firearm to Colt Gray with the knowledge that he was a threat to himself and others”.
“His charges are directly connected with the actions of his son and allowing him to possess a weapon,” said Chris Hosey, director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
The judge told Colin Gray he faces up to 180 years in prison.
Father and son questioned by police last year
Colt Gray and his father were interviewed last year in connection with online threats about a school shooting made on the gaming platform Discord following a tip-off from the FBI.
Investigators said the teenager denied making the comments.
At the time, Colin Gray told officials he had hunting guns locked in a safe in the house but his son did not have access to them.
He said his son had struggled with his parents’ separation and often got picked on at school.
“He knows the seriousness of weapons and what they can do, and how to use them and not use them,” Colin Gray said, according to a transcript of the interview.
The case was closed after neither Colt nor Colin Gray could be connected to the Discord account, while no grounds were found to confiscate the family’s guns, according to police reports released by the sheriff’s office.
Colin Gray bought his son an AR-style rifle as a gift after the pair were questioned, law enforcement sources told NBC News.
Donald Trump says a meeting is being set up between himself and Vladimir Putin – and that he and Barack Obama “probably” like each other.
Republican US president-elect Mr Trump spoke to reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Thursday, saying Russian president Mr Putin “wants to meet, and we are setting it up”.
“He has said that even publicly and we have to get that war over with. That’s a bloody mess,” Mr Trump said.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday there was a “mutual desire” to set up a meeting – but added no details had been confirmed yet and that there may be progress once Mr Trump is inaugurated on 20 January.
“Moscow has repeatedly declared its openness to contacts with international leaders, including the US president, including Donald Trump,” Mr Peskov added.
“What is required is a mutual desire and political will to conduct dialogue and resolve existing problems through dialogue. We see that Mr Trump also declares his readiness to resolve problems through dialogue. We welcome this. There are still no specifics, we proceed from the mutual readiness for the meeting.”
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Trump on Obama: ‘We just got along’
Mr Trump also made some lighter remarks regarding a viral exchange between himself and former Democrat President Barack Obamaat Jimmy Carter’s funeral on Thursday.
The pairsat together for the late president’s service in Washington DC on Thursday, and could be seen speaking for several minutes as the remaining mourners filed in before it began.
Mr Obama was seen nodding as his successor spoke before breaking into a grin.
Asked about the exchange, Mr Trump said: “I didn’t realise how friendly it looked.
“I said, ‘boy, they look like two people that like each other’. And we probably do.
“We have a little different philosophies, right? But we probably do. I don’t know. We just got along. But I got along with just about everybody.”
The amicable exchange comes after years of criticising each other in the public eye; it was Mr Trump who spread the so-called “birther” conspiracy theory about Mr Obama in 2011, falsely asserting that he was not born in the United States.
Mr Trump has repeatedly attacked the Obamas, saying the former president was “ineffective” and “terrible” and calling former first lady Michelle Obama “nasty” as recently as October last year.
On Kamala Harris’s campaign trail last year, Mr Obama said Mr Trump was a “78-year-old billionaire who has not stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago”, while the former first lady said that “the consequences of him ever being president again are brutally serious.”
The US Supreme Court has rejected a last-ditch attempt by Donald Trump to delay sentencing in the Stormy Daniels hush money case.
The president-elect was convicted on 34 counts last May in New York of falsifying business records relating to payments made to Ms Daniels before the 2016 presidential election.
Prosecutors claimed he had paid her $130,000 (£105,300) in hush money to not reveal details of what Ms Daniels said was a sexual relationship in 2006.
Mr Trump has denied any liaison with Ms Daniels or any wrongdoing.
By a majority, the Supreme Court found his sentencing would not be an insurmountable burden during the presidential transition since the presiding judge, Juan M Merchan, has indicated he will not give Mr Trump jail time, fines or probation.
Mr Trump’s attorneys argued that evidence used in the Manhattan trial violated last summer’s Supreme Court ruling giving Mr Trump broad immunity from prosecution over acts he took as president.
At the least, they said, the sentencing should be delayed while their appeals play out to avoid distracting Mr Trump during the presidential transition.
Mr Trump’s attorneys went to the justices after New York courts refused to postpone sentencing.
Judges in New York found that the convictions related to personal matters rather than Mr Trump’s official acts as president.
Mr Trump’s attorneys called the case politically motivated, and they said sentencing him now would be a “grave injustice” that threatens to disrupt the presidential transition as the Republican prepares to return to the White House.
Mr Trump has said he will appeal again: “I respect the court’s opinion – I think it was actually a very good opinion for us because you saw what they said, but they invited the appeal and the appeal is on the bigger issue. So, we’ll see how it works out,” he said at a dinner with Republican governors at his private club in Florida.
Because the New York case was a state, rather than federal crime, Mr Trump will not be able to pardon himself when he takes office on 20 January.