By Ed White -
The Associated Press
A Michigan jury resumed deliberations on Thursday in the trial that will determine whether to hold criminally responsible for a teenager who opened fire at his high school in 2021 and killed four students.
The jury heard closing arguments in a suburban Detroit courtroom and met for about 90 minutes Wednesday before leaving without a verdict in
James Crumbley's manslaughter trial.
Crumbley, 47, is the father of Ethan Crumbley, the 15-year-old who took a gun from his home and killed four students at Oxford High School on November 30, 2021.
James Crumbley enters Cheryl Matthews' Oakland County Courthouse in Michigan, Wednesday, March 13, 2024. Mandi Wright / AP
During a five-day trial, prosecutors showed that the gun, a newly acquired Sig Sauer 9mm, was not secured or far from the teen's access in the Crumbley home.
Although Michigan did not have a gun storage law at the time, James Crumbley had a “legal duty” to protect others from potential harm caused by his son, prosecutor Karen McDonald argued.
The case, McDonald said, is about much more than access to a gun.
Ethan's mental state was very deteriorated on the day of the shooting: The teenager drew a macabre drawing of a gun and a wounded man on a math assignment, and added: “The thoughts don't stop.
Help me.
(I see) blood everywhere.
The world is dead.”
However, his parents refused to take Ethan home after a brief meeting at school, and they returned to work.
They did not inform school staff that James Crumbley had purchased a gun similar to the one in the drawing four days earlier.
Ethan pulled the gun out of his backpack a few hours later and started shooting.
No one had checked his backpack.
Parents are not responsible for everything their children do, but “this is a very egregious and rare set of events,” McDonald told the jury.
In a dramatic demonstration during the trial, the prosecutor showed the jury how to use a cable to block the gun used in the shooting.
A new cable was found inside her package at the Crumbley home.
“Ten seconds” was how long it took to secure the gun, McDonald told jurors, “very easy and simple.”
The Oxford victims were Justin Shilling, 17;
Madisyn Baldwin, 17;
Hana St. Juliana, 14;
and Tate Myre, 16.
The first parents charged in a school shooting committed by their children
James and Jennifer Crumbley are the first American parents charged with responsibility for a mass school shooting committed by a minor.
Jennifer Crumbley, 45, was found guilty last month of involuntary manslaughter.
Ethan wrote in early November 2021 in his journal that he needed help for his mental health: “But my parents don't listen to me, so I can't get it.”
In her closing remarks, defense attorney Mariell Lehman claimed that James Crumbley did not know that Ethan knew where to find the gun at home.
She added that school officials seemed more concerned that he would harm himself, not others.
Undated photos provided by the Oakland County Police Department of Jennifer Crumbley and James Crumbley.AP
“They saw images that were not worrying, that are common, that other children write and draw about,” Lehman said of the child's distressing drawing on the math homework.
“The concern was that he was sad and needed to talk to someone.”
James Crumbley “had no idea” his son was capable of committing a mass shooting, he said.
Ethan Crumbley, now 17, is serving a life sentence for murder and terrorism.