The case against Jennifer and James Crumbley raises the difficult question: “As school shootings become increasingly common in the United States, can parents be held responsible for the actions of a teenage shooter?” It's on.
Michigan jurors have been wrestling with this question in recent weeks as they grapple with the aftermath of the Nov. 30, 2021, shooting that killed four children at an Oxford high school in Michigan.
And in each parent's case, the jury returned a resounding “yes.” Despite being tried separately, Jennifer and James Crumbley were found guilty of manslaughter in connection with their son Ethan's actions.
It was a historic ruling. In the United States, parents have never before been held criminally liable for manslaughter after their child commits a mass shooting.
Tuesday's sentencing hearing will decide whether he faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.
But those who welcomed the outcome — and those who warned against the legal precedent it set — say the Crumbley case is likely to have repercussions for years to come. .
“You have a grievous crime. You have a legal novelty and an unprecedented action. And you have this social event that we are all interested in, and we are all involved in one case.” We are united,” Eko Yanka, a law professor at the University of Michigan, told Al Jazeera.
“And I think there's a deep intuition about at what point a child's behavior is no longer their own.”
For weeks during the trial, Michigan prosecutors painted a damning portrait of the Crumbley family as parents who ignored red flags in the face of their son's fatal attack at Oxford High School.
Prosecutors said she not only failed to secure firearms in her home, but also failed to take “reasonable care” to prevent her son from engaging in harmful acts.
Four days before the attack, James Crumbley bought a gun for his then 15-year-old son to use in the murder. Prosecutors highlighted several signs that Ethan had severe mental health issues at the time, including hearing voices.
On the day of the shooting, the parents were called to school for their son's threatening drawings in class, but they had not notified administrators of his recent gun purchase and were unable to take Ethan home. There wasn't.
Later that day, the boy went to the bathroom and returned brandishing a semi-automatic handgun.
But the Crumbleys are not the first parents to face criminal charges after their teenage son commits a mass shooting.
After 19-year-old Robert Climo III shot and killed seven people at a Fourth of July parade in suburban Chicago in 2022, his father, Robert Climo Jr., was initially charged with seven felonies for reckless conduct. was being asked.
Prosecutors said Climo helped the 19-year-old obtain the gun his son used even though he had been warned that he could pose a threat to public safety.
But last November, Mr. Climo pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges as part of an agreement with prosecutors.
Still, prominent gun control advocates and groups say decisions like the ones against Klimo and Crumblays have a deterrent effect and could help prevent future mass shootings.
Nicholas Spurina, senior vice president of law and policy at Everytown for Gun Safety, said the convictions could serve as a warning about gun safety.
He cited a recent study that found that three-quarters of school shooters obtained the firearms they used in their attacks at home.
Some states also have laws that require gun owners to keep firearms away from children. Michigan, for example, has a “safe storage” law that requires firearms to be stored safely if minors are present.
“These rulings send a clear message: First, responsible and safe firearm storage can save lives,” Supurina said in a video posted to social media in March. ” he said.
“And secondly, there will be liability if people don't act responsibly. We hope it will help prevent future tragedies.”
Social messages and case law
But Yanka, a professor at the University of Michigan, explained that reaction within the legal community has been mixed, with some worried that Crumbley would set a precedent that would have far-reaching implications.
“Given such a painful and unlikely event, and the way the prosecution handled it, one might think, “This is what happened. [the Crumbleys] “This is such a grossly negligent parent that an incident like this will never happen again,” he said.
“But what legal experts are concerned about is that while we know the law lives on precedent, once there is a precedent, the best thing for prosecutors to do is to use that precedent. “It's a natural instinct,” he said.
Evan Vernick, a professor at Northern Illinois University School of Law, is among those warning of what a conviction could portend.
“There is a saying that says, 'Hard cases make bad laws,' which means there is always an initial terrible case that is used to justify expanding the criminal law,” he told Al Jazeera. “And there's a whole case of state intent that you're not aware of.”
Both Bernick and Janka said the precedent could be applied gradually in less visible situations, especially as a way for prosecutors to pressure suspects into plea deals. Marginalized communities can be especially at risk, Bernick said.
“I don't have much confidence in the prosecutor's exercise of discretion to select only cases like this,” he said. “Once you get a hammer, it's definitely a hammer, but everything can look like a nail, and people aren't necessarily looking at how you handle the hammer.”
“Very big gap”
While the details of the Crumbley case may be distinctly modern, pondering the limits of parental responsibility is an ancient tradition. This millennia-old problem also has deep roots in U.S. law.
Eve Blank, a psychology professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln who studies parental responsibility laws, told Al Jazeera, “There are many examples across history and cultures where there is a strong link between parental behavior and child behavior.'' Told.
The works of Greek poet Homer examine parental responsibility, she said. So are the Bible's Book of Proverbs and the Code of Hammurabi, an 18th century BC Babylonian legal code, to name a few.
Mr. Blank explained that this concept has entered U.S. law in three main areas. In 1846, Hawaii passed a law making parents civilly liable for the actions of their children. All states currently have that law.
In 1899, Colorado enacted a law that criminalized “complicity in the delinquency of minors.'' These laws were usually intended to protect children from parents or adults who would push them to do illegal activities, such as delivering drugs.
In the decades since then, a series of state laws have been enacted to hold parents criminally responsible for their children's actions, usually imposing misdemeanor charges or requiring parents to pay court-related costs. Locally, some laws are even more advanced.
For example, Vice President Kamala Harris, while San Francisco District Attorney from 2004 to 2011, oversaw a controversial truancy program that imposed misdemeanor charges on parents whose children regularly missed school. It was widely criticized for disproportionately impacting low-income and minority residents.
Still, Blank said there is a “huge gap” between the punishment of parents in past cases and the Crumbley case. She cautioned that no research has been done to determine whether punishing parents actually acts as a deterrent to others.
“I think there are some assumptions in these ideas that just don't have the empirical evidence to support them right now,” she said.
“I think [this case] The question remains whether this will give us the results we want,” she added. “So I would advocate for more empirical research on this topic.”
