One of the Kingston High School (KHS) students involved in a brutal May 2023 assault on a classmate in the campus cafeteria was sentenced last week to six-and-a-half years in prison.
17-year-old Ty’Juan Gray pleaded guilty to second-degree assault last October after agreeing to a stipulation from Ulster County Judge Bryan Rounds to serve the maximum allowable sentence, seven years. Otherwise, Gray would have stood trial for first-degree assault, which carries a maximum of 25 years in state prison.
During sentencing on Wednesday, June 26, Rounds initially declined pleas from Gray’s attorney, public defender Joey Drillings; from the district attorney’s office, which had previously recommended a sentence of three years; and from the Ulster County Probation Department, which proposed a six-month prison sentence followed by five years probation. Calling the KHS cafeteria incident “a heinous assault,” also dismissed a request from Drillings that Gray be granted youthful offender status, which would have sealed his record.
Saying that he wanted the sentence to reflect justice and not revenge, Rounds agreed to reduce the sentence from seven years to six-and-a-half to prevent Gray, who turns 18 this week, from serving his time in a maximum security prison.
“As violent as the act he committed is, I am extraordinarily concerned about him being brutalized in state prison,” Rounds said.
The victim’s mother Natalie Persad read a statement to the court in which she said the assault “robbed my son of the life he once knew,” adding that he suffered a permanent traumatic brain injury.
During sentencing, Gray’s father left the courtroom, saying, “I’m getting the fuck out of here.”
On May 3, 2023, the unnamed victim was attacked in the KHS cafeteria by Gray and an unnamed 15-year-old, the incident lasting approximately 18 seconds before being broken up by Kingston High School security. A hold-in-place lasting around 45 minutes was issued while first responders cared for the victim, who was then hospitalized. Students in the cafeteria were moved into the auditorium during this time.
In a viral video recorded by at least one student on a smartphone, authorities identified the 15-year old as kicking the victim in the head while Gray leapt from a cafeteria table onto the victim’s head. Video shown to Rounds by district attorney Emmanuel Nneji during the proceeding ended with the pair being escorted out of the cafeteria by security and off campus.
“That’s depravity,” Nneji said after the video was shown to Rounds. “That’s a lack of dignity for another person’s life.”
Rounds, who had already rejected pleas for leniency, said the nonchalance seen in the video affirmed his firm sentencing decision.
“I had no idea until today the exact circumstances under which the defendant and co-defendant left the building,” said Rounds. “After doing what they did and with a child who was dying on the concrete floor at that point, they’re escorted out of the building to the car of the person who did the videotaping.”
Attorneys for the victim have said the attack was coordinated by the pair and may also have included a student who recorded the incident and an onlooker. Rounds said the video backed that up.
“A decision was made that that was going to happen long before it happened,” Rounds said. “I think it’s a sign of how society has become in so many ways that we accept a level of violence and degradation that is far, far below what I remember my entire lifetime. It’s become entertainment. It’s sick, it’s twisted, and it’s inhumane…This defendant committed a brutal and heinous act that not only hurt a child but hurt the safety of the community itself.”
According to authorities, the victim sustained a skull fracture, and trauma and bleeding on the brain, and underwent an emergency procedure at Westchester Medical Center in Valhalla to remove part of his skull to relieve pressure on the brain.
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