(Reuters) – A Michigan judge will hold a preliminary hearing on Thursday to decide whether prosecutors had enough evidence to bring involuntary manslaughter charges against the parents of a teenager accused of killing four high school students.
James and Jennifer Crumbley are accused of buying the weapon as a Christmas present for their 15-year-old son Ethan and ignoring warning signs as late as on the day of the Nov. 30 shooting in Oxford, Michigan.
Their son has already been charged with first-degree murder in the deadliest U.S. school shooting of 2021.
All three have pleaded not guilty.
The hearing on Thursday is the second day of preliminary proceedings in which prosecutors are presenting evidence in front of Rochester District Court Judge Julie Nicholson. She will decide if there is enough evidence to take the case to trial.
On Feb. 8, prosecutors called witnesses who described the couple’s relationship, their relationship with their son and how they reacted to hearing the news of the shooting.
Four students were killed and six other students and a teacher were wounded at Oxford High School, 40 miles (65 km) north of Detroit.
The case appears to be the first time that parents of a teenage school shooter have been charged for involvement in their offspring’s alleged crimes.
It was the latest in a decades-long string of deadly American school shootings.
Four days before the shooting, Ethan accompanied his father to a gun shop, where James Crumbley bought a 9mm handgun, prosecutors said.
The next day his mother posted that the two of them were at a gun range “testing out his new Christmas present”, according to prosecutors.
Prosecutors have detailed a number of other warning signs that they said the parents failed to address, including Ethan Crumbley searching for ammunition on his phone.
On the morning of the shooting, a teacher discovered drawings by Ethan Crumbley that depicted a handgun, a bullet, and a bleeding figure. School officials then summoned the Crumbleys. The parents resisted taking their son home and did not search his backpack nor ask him about the gun, prosecutors said.
(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Chicago; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
