Jennifer Crumbley: US mother faces trial over son Ethan Crumbley’s mass shooting at Michigan school
A mother who took her son to a shooting range just days before he shot dead four students at his US school, is to go on trial, charged with involuntary manslaughter.
Jennifer Crumbley and her husband, James Crumbley are the first parents to be charged in a mass US school shooting.
They gave their son, Ethan Crumbley, access to a gun, ignored his mental health needs and declined to take him home when shown his violent drawings at school on the day of the 30 November 2021 attack, according to prosecutors.
Ethan Crumbley was jailed for life without parole
They face four charges of involuntary manslaughter each, with Ms Crumbley’s trial expected to start this week, in Oakland County court, near Detroit, while Mr Crumbley will be tried separately in March.
It’s not disputed that James Crumbley, 47, bought a gun with Ethan at his side four days before the shooting, which Ethan, then aged 15, called “my new beauty”.
The semi-automatic handgun was a Christmas present.
Jennifer Crumbley, 45, took him to a shooting range and described the outing on Instagram as a “mom and son day”.
A day before the shooting, Oxford High School in Michigan told her that Ethan was looking at ammunition on his phone.
She forgave him, texting, “I’m not mad. You have to learn not to get caught.”
Jennifer and James Crumbley in court. File pic
In December last year, Ethan Crumbley was jailed for life without parole after pleading guilty to murder, terrorism and other charges.
At his sentencing, he told a judge that he was a “really bad person” who could not stop himself.
Ethan Crumbley in court
He said [his parents] “did not know and I did not tell them what I planned to do, so they are not at fault”.
A few hours before the shooting, the Crumbleys were summoned to the school.
Ethan had drawn violent images on a maths assignment with the message: “The thoughts won’t stop. Help me.”
The parents were told to get him into therapy, but they chose not to remove him from school and left after less than 30 minutes, according to investigators.
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Ethan had brought a gun to school that day, 30 November 2021, though no one checked his rucksack.
He killed four students and injured seven more people before surrendering to police.
The parents were charged a few days later, after police found them, they said, “hiding in a building in Detroit”.
They could be jailed for up to 15 years, if convicted.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
A farmer who fell from a greenhouse roof during an anti-immigrant raid at a licensed cannabis facility in California this week has died of his injuries.
Jaime Alanis, 57, is the first person to die as a result of Donald Trump’s Immigration Compliance and Enforcement (ICE) raids.
His niece, Yesenia Duran, posted on the fundraising site GoFundMe to say her uncle was his family’s only provider and he had been sending his earnings back to his wife and daughter in Mexico.
The United Food Workers said Mr Alanis had worked on the farm for 10 years.
“These violent and cruel federal actions terrorise American communities, disrupt the American food supply chain, threaten lives and separate families,” the union said in a recent statement on X.
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The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said it executed criminal search warrants at Glass House Farms facilities on Thursday.
Mr Alanis called family to say he was hiding and possibly fleeing agents before he fell around 30ft (9m) from the roof and broke his neck, according to information from family, hospital and government sources.
Agents arrested 200 people suspected of being in the country illegally and identified at least 10 immigrant children on the sites, the DHS said in a statement.
Mr Alanis was not among them, the agency said.
“This man was not in and has not been in CBP (Customs and Border Protection) or ICE custody,” DHS assistant secretary for public affairs Tricia McLaughlin said.
“Although he was not being pursued by law enforcement, this individual climbed up to the roof of a greenhouse and fell 30ft. CBP immediately called a medivac to the scene to get him care as quickly as possible.”
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Four US citizens were arrested during the incident for allegedly “assaulting or resisting officers”, the DHS said, and authorities were offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of a person suspected of firing a gun at federal agents.
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In a statement, Glass House, a licensed Cannabis grower, said immigration agents had valid warrants. It said workers were detained and it is helping provide them with legal representation.
“Glass House has never knowingly violated applicable hiring practices and does not and has never employed minors,” it added.
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