The parents of Michigan school shooter Ethan Crumbley were each sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison on Tuesday after being found guilty of manslaughter for providing their then-15-year-old son with a gun, which he used to carry out the 2021 attack in Oxford High School that killed four people.
James Crumbley, Ethan Crumbley’s father, was sentenced to up to 15 years in prison after he was found guilty of four counts of involuntary manslaughter last month. Ethan Crumbley’s mother, Jennifer Crumbley, was sentenced to up to 15 years in prison after she was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in February.
The sentencing is believed to be the first time parents of a shooter have been held accountable for their role in a shooting. Ethan Crumbley was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in December 2023.
Both parents were given credit for time served on their sentences, and are barred from contacting the families of the victims.
Prosecutors argued that despite knowing about his declining mental health, Ethan Crumbley’s parents gave him a semi-automatic handgun days before the shooting, which he used in the attack.
During Jennifer Crumbley’s trial, prosecutors argued that she could have done several things to stop her son from shooting his classmates.
Prosecutors said that just hours before the shooting happened, the school called the parents to discuss some images Ethan Crumbley had drawn of guns and gunshot victims. Jennifer Crumbley dismissed the school’s concerns, however, and failed to tell them she had recently given her son a gun.
Months before the shooting, Ethan Crumbley texted his mom that he was hearing voices and seeing demons. But he told his friends that when he asked his mother to get medical help, she laughed at him.
“I want help but my parents don’t listen to me so I can’t get any help,” Ethan Crumbley wrote in a journal. “I have zero help for my mental problems and it’s causing me to shoot up the fucking school.”
Ethan Crumbley texted his friend nearly six months before the shooting, writing, “I actually asked my dad to take (me) to the Doctor yesterday but he just gave me some pills and told me to ‘Suck it up.’”
Prosecutors also argued that James Crumbley did not properly secure the gun he bought his son.
Six people read victim impact statements, including Nicole Beausoleil, the mother of Madisyn Baldwin, who was killed in the shooting. Beausoleil asked the judge to enforce the maximum sentence “as it will never come close to the life sentence I was given.”
Steve St. Juliana, the father of victim Hana St. Juliana, said he remains a shell of the person he used to be. “Every day is a battle in an attempt to move forward,” he said.
Buck Myre, the father of victim Tate Myre, fought back tears as he said he wasn’t going to give a second of his time to the Crumbleys. He said he wants an investigation into the “horrible response” of the shooting.
Jennifer Crumbley, wearing a black and white prison shirt and glasses, offered her sorrow in her final statements to the court. Her husband sat across the table from her, in an orange jumpsuit and bound by chains and handcuffs. In March, he was admonished for threatening a prosecutor in the case. He addressed the parents in the courtroom and said, “My heart pours out to every single one of you. It really does.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.