Teenager who killed four classmates near Detroit with gun given to him for Christmas jailed for life
A teenager who fatally shot four classmates two years ago at his high school has been sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Ethan Crumbley was just 15-years-old when he opened fire on 30 November 2021, with a semi-automatic handgun his father had bought him as a Christmas gift days earlier.
Along with the four classmates he killed, Crumbley wounded six other students and a teacher at the school in Oxford Township, about 40 miles north of Detroit.
His parents have also been charged with involuntary manslaughter in connection with the shooting, in one of the first US cases that seeks to hold parents accountable for their child’s school shooting.
Crumbley pleaded guilty last year to two dozen counts, including one count of terrorism causing death and four counts of first-degree murder.
A judge rejected pleas for a shorter sentence and ensured that Crumbley, now 17, will not get an opportunity for parole.
Crumbley pleaded guilty to 24 charges, including first-degree murder and terrorism
“My actions were what I chose to do. I could not stop myself… I am a really bad person. I’ve done terrible things,” Crumbley said before the sentence was announced.
He said he was sorry and pledged to change while behind bars.
Life sentences for teenagers are rare in Michigan since the US Supreme Court and the state’s highest court said the violent acts of minors must be viewed differently than the crimes of adults.
At a hearing in Oakland County Circuit Court on Friday, relatives of the victims described their daily struggles to move past the shooting and urged Judge Kwame Rowe to lock Crumbley up for the rest of his life.
“We are miserable. We miss Tate,” said Buck Myre, the father of Tate Myre. “Our family has a permanent hole in it that can never be fixed – ever.”
Ethan’s parents, James and Jennifer Crumbley, have also been charged over the shooting for making the gun accessible to their son
Nicole Beausoleil recalled seeing the body of her daughter, Madisyn Baldwin, at the medical examiner’s office, her hand with blue-painted fingernails sticking out from a covering.
“I looked though the glass. My scream should have shattered it,” Ms Beausoleil said.
Jill Soave, the mother of Justin Shilling, told the gunman that he executed a boy who could have helped him navigate awkward teenage years.
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“If you were that lonely, that miserable and lost, and you really needed a friend, Justin would have been your friend – if only you had asked,” Ms Soave said.
Crumbley looked down as Ms Soave and others spoke.
Like their son, Jennifer and James Crumbley are locked up in the county jail.
They are awaiting trial on involuntary manslaughter charges, accused of making a gun accessible at home and neglecting the gunman’s mental health.
Crumbley and his parents met school staff on the day of the shooting after a teacher noticed violent drawings.
But no one checked his backpack for a gun and he was allowed to stay.
US
Five family members, including 2-year-old, found dead alongside teen with gunshot wounds at Utah home
Five members of the same family, including a two-year-old girl, have been found dead at a home in the US state of Utah.
A 17-year-old boy was also found alive but with gunshot wounds.
It is not yet clear whether he is a suspect or victim in the case, according to local police.
Roxeanne Vainuku, police spokesperson for West Valley City, a suburb of Salt Lake City, said it’s thought to be an isolated incident and “we do not believe there’s a suspect on the loose”.
A nine-year-old girl and 11-year-old boy were found alongside the 2-year-old and a man, 42, and woman, 38.
Forensic teams examine the family home in West Valley City. Pic: The Deseret News/AP
It has not been revealed how the five people died and forensic teams have been at the house as part of a homicide investigation.
Police were alerted on Tuesday by a concerned relative who entered the home through the garage and found the 17-year-old boy alive.
The boy “suffered a pretty significant injury”, Ms Vainuku said, adding that “we’ve not really been able to communicate with him”.
When officers arrived they discovered the victims in the main part of the home.
The victims appeared to match what police know about who lived at the house – a family with two parents and four children ages 2 to 17, Ms Vainuku said.
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Police were initially called to the home on Monday after a relative said the woman who lives there had not been in touch for a few days.
Officers did not get any response and left, as there was no sign of an emergency, before returning on Tuesday evening when the same women called them again.
West Valley City is about 10 miles (16km) southwest of Salt Lake City.
A death row inmate’s last words were “let’s get this over with” before he became the first person to be executed in the US state of Indiana in 15 years.
Joseph Corcoran, 49, died by lethal injection on Wednesday for the 1997 murders of his brother, his sister’s fiancee and two other men.
He had been on death row since 1999 and was executed despite his legal team and campaigners appealing to Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb to use his powers to grant clemency.
In a petition to the federal courts, including the US Supreme Court, the quadruple murderer’s lawyers maintained that he suffered from “severe and longstanding paranoid schizophrenia”.
They added that this was documented in self-published books from prison in which he described being subject to “ultrasonic surveillance”.
Deputy public defender Joanna Green said on Tuesday: “If the courts do not stay the execution, we are asking Gov Holcomb to grant clemency to Joe, a seriously mentally ill man.”
It came a day after a federal appeals court ruled that Corcoran was mentally fit enough to be executed.
Anti-death penalty groups had spent the past few days demonstrating outside Indiana’s state capitol building which houses the office of Mr Holcomb, the Indiana General Assembly and the Indiana Supreme Court.
They also delivered letters to Mr Holcomb’s office urging him to grant clemency.
Holcomb’s office did not immediately respond to a request from Sky News’ US partner network NBC News on Tuesday.
The governor announced in June that the state had procured pentobarbital, a sedative used in lethal injections, after “years of effort”.
He said at the time: “Accordingly, I am fulfilling my duties as governor to follow the law and move forward appropriately in this matter.”
An undated photo of Joseph Corcoran. Pic: AP
Corcoran’s last meal
The Indiana Department of Correction began the execution process shortly after midnight local time on Wednesday and Corcoran was pronounced dead around 44 minutes later.
The department said his last words were: “Not really. Let’s get this over with.”
Corcoran requested Ben & Jerry’s ice cream as his last meal, the department added.
Ahead of the execution, anti-death penalty campaigners criticised the Indiana Department of Correction for carrying out the process without media witnesses.
Of the 27 states that still allow for capital punishment, only Indiana and Wyoming exclude media witnesses, according to the Death Penalty Information Centre.
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‘It’s going to ruin Christmas’
Before the execution, David Frank, the president of the Indiana Abolition Coalition, made reference to Christmas when he said: “One week before we welcome the light of the Prince of Peace into the world… the state in secret, under cover of darkness, plans to take the life of Mr Corcoran.”
Meanwhile, Corcoran’s sister Kelly Ernst, whose fiancee Robert Scott Turner was one of his victims, said she believes the death penalty should be abolished and criticised the state’s decision to execute her brother a week before Christmas.
Ms Ernst said: “My sister and I, our birthdays are in December… I mean, it just feels like it’s going to ruin Christmas for the rest of our lives. That’s just what it feels like.”
What was Corcoran convicted of?
Corcoran was 22 when he fatally shot his brother James, 30, at the home they shared in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
He also killed Turner, 32, and friends Douglas Stillwell and Timothy Bricker, both 30.
Five years earlier, Corcoran was acquitted of the murders of his parents, Jack and Kathryn Corcoran, after jurors found not enough evidence to convict.
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