Redefining Parental Responsibility: The Jennifer Crumbley Verdict and Its Implications for Mass Shooting Cases
For the first time, a parent has been charged with manslaughter after her child committed a school shooting.
Photo Courtesy of Rebecca Cook, Reuters
A Michigan state court set an unexpected precedent, expanding the scope of parental liability. For the first time, a parent has been charged with manslaughter after her child committed a school shooting. Jennifer Crumbley was convicted on four counts of involuntary manslaughter in the Oakland County Circuit Court, and the trial ultimately came down to one critical question. Should Jennifer Crumbley have been aware of her son’s mental health concerns?
2021 Oxford Shooting
Jennifer’s son, Ethan, was 15 years old when he fatally shot and killed four students at Michigan Oxford High School. Several days earlier, Ethan was caught looking up ammunition on his cell phone during class. His search was reported to school personnel, and when asked about it, Ethan told the school he and his mother had recently been at a shooting range because shooting sports are a “family hobby.” Although Ethan had an explanation for his online searches, the school notified Jennifer. Jennifer dismissed the school’s concerns and laughed it off in a text message to Ethan, “Lol. I’m not mad at you. You have to learn not to get caught.”
On the day of the shooting, Ethan was sent down to the principal’s office after a teacher noticed a drawing depicting a gun and bullets on his paper. The drawings were shown to Jennifer, and the school recommended that Ethan receive help as soon as possible. Despite the school’s concerns, Jennifer declined to take Ethan home because she “needed to get back to work.”
Ethan opened fire on his classmates shortly after that meeting. The gun he used had been purchased for him by his parents. Ethan was sentenced to life in prison, but he wouldn’t be the only member of the Crumbley family who would face punishment.
Ethan may have pulled the trigger, but that does not eliminate Jennifer’s liability.
Under the principle of parental liability, a parent may be responsible for the criminal acts of their children. A common example of how this has played out is under the framework of Child Access Prevention (CAP) laws. The purpose of CAP laws is to impose liability on parents for failing to secure their guns safely. Approximately 70-90% of firearms used in school shootings come from the perpetrator’s home. Parents have previously been charged with child neglect, reckless conduct, or the illegal possession of firearms for the weapon-based offenses committed by their children.
Through the framework of parental liability, though Ethan may have pulled the trigger, Jennifer may still be liable. Prosecutors in Oakland County charged Jennifer Crumbley with four counts of involuntary manslaughter, one count for each student that died. Involuntary manslaughter is caused by a grossly negligent act, or failure to act, that results in death. Prosecutors argued that Jennifer’s failure to act was a direct and foreseeable outcome of her son’s actions. At trial, prosecutors presented evidence of Ethan’s unanswered cries for help, including journal entries expressing his wishes to see a therapist and text messages to Jennifer describing the hallucinations he was experiencing.
Contrary to this evidence, Jennifer testified she was unaware of Ethan’s mental health problems. Yet, when the school counselor reported that Ethan could be a danger to himself and that he needed mental health treatment, Jennifer put her job above her son’s needs. According to prosecutors, Jennifer’s repeated failures to recognize her son’s mental health concerns and act on them was a foreseeable and direct cause of the school shooting that could have been prevented.
In addition to failing to recognize her son’s mental health concerns, Jennifer provided him with the gun he would use to complete his manifesto. Days before the shooting, Ethan’s parents purchased him a pistol as an early Christmas present. The pistol was unsecured in the Crumbley’s house, where Ethan could, and did, access it. Various social media posts confirm Ethan had the pistol in the days leading up to the shooting.
Legal Significance
This case sets a new precedent for who can be held liable for mass shootings. Diverging from previous cases where parents were charged under CAP laws, prosecutors in Oakland County changed tactics. They charged Jennifer with four counts of involuntary manslaughter, one count for each student who died. Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said that the charges were “intended to hold individuals who contributed to this tragedy accountable” in the absence of Michigan’s safe storage laws.
While there are concerns about this new precedent, legal experts are divided about whether this will become the new practice for holding parents liable. Firearms are the leading cause of death in children, with the trend increasing over the years. With that context, those in support of gun reform are in favor of this new ruling because it is a new avenue to hold people responsible for firearm-related fatalities.
In contrast, others worry that implementing this precedent as a new standard may criminalize parental oversight. In the New York Times podcast “The Daily,” Lisa Miller explained that there is “a big difference between being an awful mom and being a criminally responsible one.” Further, an FBI analysis of the pre-attack behaviors of mass shooters revealed that parents are the least likely to detect violent tendencies in their children. If parents are the least likely to detect violent tendencies in their children, it will pose a significant challenge for prosecutors to prove foreseeability. This finding further complicates the idea that parents should be held criminally liable for their children’s actions.
Despite concerns about this precedent, it’s important to recognize that this charge would not have been able to proceed without ample evidence of gross negligence. According to Eve Primus, Yale Kamisar Collegiate Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School, “[t]here were circumstances around Ethan Crumbley’s case that gave the prosecutor a lot of evidence that probably doesn’t exist in a lot of other cases.” Despite Jennifer’s attempts to get the charges dismissed, the Michigan Appellate Court held there was sufficient evidence to proceed to trial on the involuntary manslaughter charges. In his concurring opinion, Justice Riordan stated that there was “disturbing evidence that [Ethan] contemplated harming others and [Jennifer] did nothing when confronted with that evidence.”
Detroit criminal law attorney William Swor believes “this will not be the last time we see this,” and he was right. Only months after Jennifer’s conviction, tragedy occurred once again at Apalachee High School. For the murders committed by his son, Colin Gray was charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter and two counts of felony second-degree murder.
The conviction of Jennifer Crumbley marks a pivotal moment in the American court system. This unprecedented decision shows that parents may be criminally responsible for their children’s crimes when the act can be proven preventable. For now, the verdict provides a sense of justice to the families and victims affected by the shooting, in addition to sending a strong message that parents need to be responsible for their children’s actions. Though some legal experts are concerned about how far prosecutors will push the envelope to secure a conviction, it is too soon to predict the true impact of this precedent.
