Posted on 12/03/2021 11:02:25 AM PST by Navy Patriot
A prosecutor says the parents of a teen accused of killing four students at a Michigan high school were summoned a few hours earlier after a teacher found a drawing of a gun, a person bleeding and the words “help me.”
Oakland County prosecutor Karen McDonald made the disclosure Friday as she filed involuntary manslaughter charges against Jennifer and James Crumbley, the parents of 15-year-old Ethan Crumbley.
McDonald says the gun used in the shootings at Oxford High School was purchased by James Crumbley a week ago and given to the boy.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
The school (principal, psychologist, guidance counselor, school resource officer, teacher) is culpable, the parents are culpable, the kid is culpable.
Check these parents’ bank accounts! How much money did a proxy of George Soros pay them? If you look at the sequence of events, it sure DOES look like every action was deliberate and aimed at ANOTHER SCHOOL SHOOTING for the gun-grabbing left to feast upon.
"It depends" on facts not in your hypothetical.
This case will turn on the application of criminal negligence in Michigan law. Fiver government officials were charged with this for the Flint water situation.
The jury will decide first, and appellate court of Michigan Supreme court will get the last word if it wants it.
Civil negligence holds us to behave in light of reasonably foreseeable consequences. The law does not expect us to be perfect (at least not in principle), but does expect a certain amount of care.
Also in civil law, as close as it gets to criminal negligence, is a punitive damages award. The standard for this, on paper, is acting in wanton and reckless disregard of the well being of others.
The jury is in a position of being allowed to second guess, as the jury is supposed to reflect society sensibilities. They will have to find "something" in the parents head - what did they know? and what did they do about it?
Back to your hypothetical - if your kid has a habit of taking the car and driving recklessly, and you know that, then you best make an effort keep the keys away or otherwise disable the car. I do wonder how many kids make death threats. The number of bomb threats to schools is thousands a year. I would guess the number of kids expressing death threats is millions.
If she knew enough to send him a text, then she knew enough to know that 1) he had access to a gun, and 2) that he had intent. Not making a more active effort to stop him by calling the cops is inexcusable.
-—school culpable——yeah, some big checks are gonna get written over this clusterbleep.
Difference is the school didn’t know that he actually had access to a gun at home.
Everyone has access to a gun. Even criminals.
No, everyone does not. Certainly not in terms of access being even close to equal.
Makes one wonder if, in Michigan or Oakland County, a black family had a child that started misbehaving with a gun at 15 or so, and was cycled through the children's justice system until that child eventually killed people.
Were the parents in that family charged?
Reviewing Michigan murder statistics just might shed some light on this case.
Either way, the parents are toast. The civil lawsuits alone will destroy them.
More context is needed to understand the mothers’s text. Specifically, did the criminal text her from the bathroom immediately prior to exiting and starting his rampage? Or was there a larger time gap during which she might have alerted the school/police? If the latter, …
Will get back to you. My husband knows.
On my last NICS paperwork, I had to swear that the firearm I was buying was for me.
Clearly, the parents bought this for their son, thereby committing perjury on the form.
Also, transferring a gun to an unlawful holder (under 21 in this case) is a violation.
If the DA doesn’t charge on at least those counts, it’ll be another case of refusing to enforce existing law.
“Based on available information”
No, I wouldn’t charge but who knows what comes out. From what I see from a few stories is the press is attempting to paint a violent family where there is none.
My guess is the kid is developing schizophrenia and he hasn’t been diagnosed yet.
Here’s some stuff I’ve read and why I think none is actionable (for charging parents):
-”Parents have criminal records”: Yes, DUI and bad check stuff, all around 10 years old. No gun or violence charges so not enough to make me think it’s a terrible household.
-”Parents shown pic”: - This might be enough to get the kid checked out by a shrink, but if it were such a true sign of impending violence, the kid would’ve been kicked out of the school immediately.
If the parents are not guilty of taking action here, then so is the school. Also keep in mind, in some states, kids have been kicked out of schooling for using their index finger and thumb as a “gun”. The parents don’t seem to appreciate overreaction based on what I’ve read. Unfortunately in this case, the pic turned out to be a sign, but, again, no way to really know in advance. Abundance of caution in this regards means kids being expelled for pew-pew sounds.
Also along these lines, the kid was previously “caught” looking up ammo on his phone. The school didn’t like this either but given the impending xmas gift, not surprising and probably gave the parents the impression that the school was filled with overreacting anti gun nuts. Were it not for this, they may have actually taken the pic more seriously.
-”Xmas present”/”Don’t do it”: The father bought the gun and a media post says it’s his present. Ok, so what? Does this mean they planned on the kid toting it around outside of their control? The only people I hear fearing getting kids trained how to respect and handle firearms are anti gun folks typically.
The “Don’t Do It line” was a text about a half hour after the shooting. Father called 911 around same time. Sounds to me like they heard about the shooting, checked to find the gun missing, and acted as they did. Had there been a “don’t do it” before the shooting and no 911 call, I might lean towards parent culpability but that is apparently not the case.
-”Prosecuter says parents difficult to work with”, From another article which also says they elected to remain silent from the get go so it looks like we have another AG’s office that has deep problems with the 5th amendment like in the Rittenhouse case.
-”Guns not locked up” - a mistake but not agains the law there. Same with ammo.
I think that about covers what I’ve heard, “fact-wise”.
He’s 15, and not to have a firearm without adult supervision according to stste law, or so I’ve been told.
Someone has to be held responsible for acquiring it for him.
Well its a good thing 15 year old boys with behavioral problems never lie. And social media posts are always factual. and the parents should have know that he was about to start killing people.
This logic can then be applied to leaving your car key readily available to an adolescent and he/she take the car for a joy ride and harms someone. You can then be held criminally responsible? What about a knife in the kitchen?
But we have to hold someone responsible, so how about the shooter.
Is he being charged as an adult? If so then how can we charge anyone else for his behavior?
The shooter was having a mental break, the parents were enablers which made all three dangerous.. The school saw terrifying evidence and it was their responsibility to take control and act immediately, instead of giving them 48 hours to get counseling, four kids would be alive
I haven’t read anything about the texts or about whether or not the parents gave their son the gun.
This is a general question. Parents are responsible for the actions of their children. But if the child is charged as an adult, it seems like then the parents shouldn’t be responsible. If a non-related adult took a gun that wasn’t secured from the home of someone and committed a crime, could the homeowner be charged (if it’s in a state where there is no law requiring guns to be secured).
Can’t believe some of the comments here.
Since some of you appear to know little about the actual facts involved, consider the following..
- The gun was bought FOR ETHAN (the shooter) by his dad on Black Friday at an Oxford gun shop, apparently as an illegal “straw purchase”. (Dad said he was buying for himself, then gave the gun to his son as a CHRISTMAS PRESENT). I later found out this is a federal felony punishable by up to 20 years. Hope the dad is charged on that in addition to the 4 counts of manslaughter he and his wife already got charged with by the County prosecutor today.
- Ethan posted something along the lines of “here’s MY new baby..Sig Sauer 9mm..any questions glad to answer” on Social media a couple days before the shootings. This further establishes the gun was bought FOR HIM by his dad.
- Kids cannot own or possess handguns in Michigan.
- Ethan drew some very disturbing images in class that were discovered and photographed by a teacher. Those images clearly showed that he intended to commit murder and even included a smiley emoji below images of some dead bodies.
- He was also caught browsing for ammo on his phone during class. Parents were notified yet never responded to the school. Instead, his mother texted him “LOL, I’m not mad at you..just try to not get caught next time”.
- The school pulled the parents in THAT SAME DAY to discuss “disturbing behavior” (like, drawing images of murdering people with a handgun). They were told to take him with them but did not do so. Why in the hell the school allowed him to return to class, did not even check his backpack, and didn’t eject him immediately will likely be the basis of many future lawsuits against the school that will be chip shots to win - probably to the tune of tens of millions of dollars for the plaintiffs.
This is hardly a “Soviet Show Trial”. Ethan cold-bloodedly killed 4 of his classmates with pre-meditation (as proven by writings, videos and social media posts made the night before) and injured 7 others. He appears to have done so gleefully. If that doesn’t define PURE EVIL, I’m not what does.
How some of you can even go down the “but, but, but, it’s just another trumped up story to take away our guns!!” is beyond me and candidly makes me sick to my stomach. Let’s not lose sight of the fact that four teenagers will never come home again. And no gun law would have changed it. His parents failed (buying him the gun and then not responding to the school when it was clear there danger). The school failed in not stopping him when it was clear there was danger (and will probably be sued to kingdom come). And the kid was just plain evil to the core.
The entire thing is tragic beyond words. Let’s not lose sight of the massive human tragedy here trying to make cheap political points one way or the other.
Not true. If the parents made every effort with locks, gun safe and told the kid it was against the law they did NOT give the kid access, it is on the kid for being a thief.
Does not sound as if that particular household did those things. The school has to assume parents are following the law.
It IS against the law.
Nobody wanted to make the tough call, people seem to run away from accountability now.
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