DETROIT (WWJ) - Will the parents of the Oxford High School shooter stand trial? It's the question that a three-judge panel must decide after hearing arguments over criminal charges filed against James and Jennifer Crumbley on Tuesday morning.
The couple have each been charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter in connection to the mass shooting their son, Ethan Crumbley, pled guilty to carrying out at Oxford High School on Nov. 30, 2021.
Four students, Madisyn Baldwin, 17, Justin Shilling, 17, Tate Myre, 16 and Hana St. Juliana, 14, were killed in the tragedy while seven other people, including a teacher, were wounded.
WWJ's Jon Hewett reported that attorney Shannon Smith, who represents Jennifer Crumbley, spoke with judges Christopher Yates and Michael Riordan, arguing the charges against her client should be dismissed.
"We're talking about a 16-year-old who wrote elaborate and deliberate plans in a journal that that he only knew about," Smith argued. "And until the prosecution can show that the parents were more a part of knowing that was the plan and that it was foreseeable he would actually take a gun and shoot other people."
"They came into the school, true. Good for them," one of the judges responded. "But then they just left, didn't hug him, left the school -- left him in for the rest of the day."
"They also didn't look in the backpack," the other judge noted.
"Everyone was convinced EC was not a threat to other people's safety, if any concern it was a suicidal concern for ECN himself," Smith continued.
Hewett explained that Ethan Crumbley was referred to as "EC" in the courtroom as the judges had asked that for public consumption they want to cut down on the naming of a minor even -- though he was charged as an adult -- in this case.
The couples' attorneys argued that the prosecution "failed to point to a single case where a person can be held responsible for the planned and deliberate acts of another person."
Prosecutors maintained that James and Jennifer both knew their son was troubled and failed to intervene even after their son showed numerous warning signs that he was in mental distress, Hewett said.
He also armed him, allegedly having purchased him a gun just days before the shootings.
As gathered through the investigation, prosecutors relayed witness accounts that said the couple focused on their farm animals and dated outside their marriage, often leaving their son at home with instability and no supervision from the time he was a young child.
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," prosecutors argued in a previous court filing.
Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald claims the parents bought the gun used in the shooting for their teenaged son and didn't get him help when he needed it.
The couple's 16-year-old son pleaded guilty on Oct. 24 to all 24 felony charges related to the shooting, including four counts of first-degree murder and one count of terrorism.
Both James and Jennifer have been behind bars for the better part of a year, pending the trial.
"A decision from the Court of Appeals as to whether or not the case can proceed against James and Jennifer Crumbley is expected within the next several weeks," Hewett reported.
The case is setting legal precedents across the nation as no parents of mass murderers have ever been charged. Defense lawyers, meanwhile, argue that the couple can't be held criminally responsible for their son's actions.