(WWJ) – New court filings from the Oakland County Prosecutor are asking a judge to submit evidence of bad parenting in the case of James and Jennifer Crumbley, who have been charged with involuntary manslaughter in connection with the Oxford High School shooting last November.
Four Oxford students were killed on Nov. 30 when the Crumbleys’ son, Ethan, opened fire inside the school. Prosecutors are arguing the parents’ troubles in their family lives, including arguments, drinking and infidelity, led him down a “pathway to violence,” the trial strategy the prosecution plans to use.
In this week’s court filings, prosecutors say interviews with friends and associates show a pattern of a “toxic” home where Crumbley was inserted into the couple’s problems over money and infidelity.
The teen, 15 years old at the time he carried out the attack that killed four students and injured seven other people on Nov. 30, lived in a home with instability and no supervision since he was a young child, the court document says.
That “helped lay the foundation for his later violence,” prosecutors say.
"Put simply, they created an environment in which their son's violent tendencies flourished. They were aware their son was troubled, and then they bought him a gun," the filing says.
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The document alleges when Ethan was just 6 years old, his mother brought him to spend the night at her boyfriend’s house, and while he was sitting on the couch, she gave her boyfriend an ultimatum – let her move in with him or she was moving to Michigan with her husband.
Prosecutors say video of an argument about this incident will be shown during the trial.
The document also alleges the Crumbleys spent nearly $4,000 on alcohol in 2021 -- and potentially more with cash purchases -- and drinking was often a problem in their home.
Ethan Crumbley’s half-brother, who was eventually kicked out of their home, according to the filing, will testify about the “defendants’ daily conflict, drinking, and excessive time spent at the barn,” according to the document.
“Alcohol and substance abuse are relevant risk factors to the pathway to violence if it occurred repeatedly, daily and in front of their son because it contributes to the level of trauma, chaos and conflict their son experienced leading up to the shooting,” prosecutors say. “Their son was deteriorating before their eyes; he went through stretches of sleeping only a few hours per night -- staying up very late at night while the defendants drank, argued and slept only a few feet away in a bedroom that shared a wall with the shooter's room. While going through these stretches of barely sleeping, he complained of seeing demons and asked for help. The defendants simply ignored him.”