From left, James Crumbley, defense lawyer Mariell Lehman, Jennifer Crumbley and defense lawyer Shannon Smith await sentencing in Oakland County, Michigan, court on Tuesday, April 9, 2024. The Crumbleys were convicted of involuntary manslaughter for a school shooting committed by their son in 2021. | Ed White, AP
Published on April 9, 2024 at 3:15 pm
James and Jennifer Crumbley, whose son murdered four classmates and shot seven other people at Oxford High School in 2021, were each sentenced Tuesday to between 10 and 15 years in prison.
Both Crumbleys were found guilty in separate trials on four counts of involuntary manslaughter. Each of those charges carried a maximum penalty of 15 years, and the sentences are to be served concurrently.
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The couple once lived and worked in Jacksonville. James Crumbley grew up at the Beaches and went to Fletcher High School from 1990 to 1994, reported News4Jax, a Jacksonville Today news partner.
The couple both worked in business development and marketing before moving to Washington state and Michigan, News4Jax said. Their last known address locally was in Atlantic Beach.
The sentences handed down by Judge Cheryl Matthews in Pontiac, Michigan, cap a case that many legal experts say might set a precedent for charging parents with serious crimes because of actions taken by their child.
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Their son, Ethan Crumbley, pleaded guilty to murder and was sentenced to life without parole for the school shooting he carried out when he was 15.
A rare prosecution
The Crumbleys are believed to be the first parents of a mass school shooter to have been charged and convicted of such crimes.
Prosecutors never claimed the parents knew about their son’s plans to go on a killing spree at Michigan’s Oxford High School. However, they argued the Crumbleys ignored signs their son was seriously troubled and instead bought him a powerful Sig Sauer 9mm handgun as an early Christmas present.
They never told counselors about the gun they gifted their child when they were called to a meeting at the school the day of the shooting, not even when they were shown drawings the teen made featuring a pistol resembling the Sig Sauer alongside a figure with bullet wounds and phrases like “blood everywhere” and “help me, the thoughts won’t stop.”
Instead, the Crumbleys left their son at school and returned to work. A few hours later, Ethan emerged from a school bathroom with the gun and began firing his first of 32 shots.
Prosecutors told the jury if the Crumbleys had taken a “tragically few steps,” four Oxford students would likely still be alive.
They showed evidence that the murder weapon was never properly secured away from their troubled son.
In court, Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald used the murder weapon to demonstrate how to use a cable lock to keep the gun from being fired.
The process took about 10 seconds.
A ‘chilling’ lack of remorse
The prosecution had asked for the Crumbleys to serve 10 to 15 years in prison, citing what they called a “chilling lack of remorse” on the part of both parents after the shooting.
Prosecutors noted that Jennifer Crumbley testified during her trial that “I’ve asked myself if I would’ve done anything differently. And I wouldn’t have.”
And they pointed to repeated profanity-laced threats James Crumbley made against Oakland County prosecutor Karen McDonald on jailhouse phone calls he knew were being recorded, as well as in an electronic message.
‘Mistakes any parent could make’
James Crumbley’s attorney countered that his client had not physically threatened the prosecutor, merely “vented” his anger over what he saw as an unjust incarceration.
The Crumbleys said they, too, were victims of their son, who they claimed had “manipulated” them into the purchase of a gun they had no idea he would use to kill.
They argued they made “mistakes any parent could make,” given the information they had.
Defense attorneys for the couple noted an Oxford High counselor determined Ethan could remain in school the day of the shooting because he did not seem to pose a danger to himself or anyone else.
The couple maintained they thought their son was a normal teenager simply depressed over the loss of his grandmother, a pet dog and a friend who had moved away.
In a presentencing interview with state officials, Jennifer Crumbley said that with the benefit of hindsight, “there are so many things I would change if I could go back in time.”
Defense claims extra prison time unnecessary
The Crumbleys had asked to be sentenced to time served.
Defense attorneys argued the parents had already spent more than 2½ years in prison locked in a cell for 23 hours a day, and that further prison time was not necessary because the Crumbleys were not a threat to the public.
Defense attorney Shannon Smith also said more time would not deter others from committing a similar offense because “there is no person who would want the events of Nov. 30, 2021, to repeat themselves.”
Smith added that, far from being the uncaring, remorseless mother prosecutors had portrayed to the public and the media, Jennifer Crumbley was focused on her son and distraught over the devastation her son caused.
In a sentencing memo, Jennifer Crumbley’s parents and others pleaded with the court for leniency. A young woman who said she was 18 when she became Crumbley’s cellmate for a year and a half also wrote to the judge.
She said Crumbley had greeted her with a basket of snacks and served as a mother figure to her.
The woman also wrote that inmates screamed threats at Crumbley, who tearfully told them she was sorry and “wished she could change everything her son had done.”
The sentences
The Crumbleys are likely to appeal their sentences.
Their son, Ethan Crumbley, is expected to do the same. He did not testify in either trial for his parents. He pleaded guilty in October 2022 to the killings and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
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