FILE PHOTO: Ethan Crumbley attends a hearing at Oakland County circuit court on February 22, 2022 in Pontiac, Michigan. Crumbley, 15, is charged with the fatal shooting of four fellow students and the wounding of seven others, including a teacher at Oxford high school on Nov. 30. David Guralnick-Pool/Getty Images/AFP (Photo by POOL / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / Getty Images via AFP)
Washington, United States — An American teenager was sentenced to life in prison on Friday for shooting dead four students at his Michigan high school, with the case drawing additional attention because his parents are also facing charges.
Ethan Crumbley was 15 years old at the time of the November 30, 2021 shooting at Oxford High School, north of Detroit, but was charged as an adult.
Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Kwame Rowe sentenced Crumbley, now 17, to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
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Crumbley, who was wearing large black glasses and dressed in an orange prison jumpsuit, addressed the court before the sentencing, saying he was a “really bad person.”
Parents of the victims and survivors of the mass shooting also spoke about the impact of the murders on their lives.
“For the past two years our family has been navigating our way through complete hell,” said Buck Myre, whose son Tate was among those killed.
“We miss Tate,” Myre said. “Our family has a permanent hole in it that can never be fixed. Ever.”
Crumbley pleaded guilty in October of last year to bringing a 9mm Sig Sauer handgun to school and opening fire on fellow students.
Four classmates between the ages of 14 and 17 were killed and six other students and a teacher were wounded.
FILE PHOTO: Jennifer Crumbley and her husband James Crumbley, parents of the alleged teen Oxford High School shooter Ethan Crumbley who is charged with killing four people and wounding seven others, appear in 6th Circuit Court for their pretrial hearing on March 22, 2022 in Pontiac, Michigan. Both parents are being charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter. It is the first time in the U.S. that the parents of an alleged mass school shooter have been charged in connection with their child’s alleged school shooting. Bill Pugliano/Getty Images/AFP (Photo by BILL PUGLIANO / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / Getty Images via AFP)
Parents facing charges
While school shootings carried out by teens have become a sadly familiar part of American life, it is highly unusual for parents to face charges.
Crumbley’s parents, James and Jennifer Crumbley, have been charged with involuntary manslaughter.
They are accused not only of supplying their son with a weapon, but of ignoring escalating warnings that he appeared to be on the brink of violence.
James Crumbley allegedly bought the handgun for his son and his wife took the boy to a shooting range just days before the attack.
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The Crumbleys were summoned to the school on the day of the shooting after a teacher was “alarmed” by a note she found on Ethan’s desk.
The parents were shown the drawing and advised they needed to get the boy into counseling.
They allegedly resisted taking their son home and he returned to class.
He later entered a bathroom, emerged with the gun which had been concealed in his backpack and fired more than 30 shots.
The father of an Illinois man accused of killing seven people in July 2022 pleaded guilty in November to “reckless conduct” for helping his son obtain the assault rifle used in the mass shooting.