Oxford school shooter Ethan Crumbley warned his parents ignored his pleas for help in the run-up to the 2021 massacre, shocking diary entries shown in court on Thursday revealed.
Crumbley, then 15, wrote in his diary: ‘I don’t have any help for my mental problems and it’s making me shoot up the bloody school.’
“My parents won’t listen to me about help or therapist,” he continued, writing that he would spend the rest of his life in prison, while “many people have about a day to live.”
The disturbing diary entries were read out in court on Friday, where Crumbley’s mother Jennifer is on trial for involuntary manslaughter – the first time a parent has been charged over a US school shooting.
Jennifer burst into tears Thursday as the diary entries were read by an investigator, who held her head in her hands and refused to look at the screen shown to jurors.
Ethan is serving a life sentence for the shooting that killed four people. His father James faces the same charges as Jennifer, and his trial is scheduled for March.
Jennifer Crumbley broke down in tears as her son’s disturbing diary entries were read out in court on Thursday, in which he claimed his parents ignored his pleas for help.
The mother held her head in her hands and refused to look at a screen showing Ethan Crumbley’s final diary entries to jurors
In a diary entry shown on Thursday, Ethan wrote: ‘I have no help for my mental issues and it’s making me shoot up the damn school’
“I want help but my parents don’t listen to me so I can’t get help,” read another post
Ethan Crumbley pleaded guilty to his crimes and is currently serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole
The disturbing diary entries were read out after it emerged on Thursday that James and Jennifer had emptied their son’s bank account on the day of the shooting, withdrawing $3,000 and leaving just 99 cents.
In the days after the shooting, the couple appeared to try to flee as police sought them out for questioning, withdrawing another $6,000 from two other accounts, according to testimony from Lt. Timothy Willis of the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office.
The couple stayed in several hotels and bought new phones after they were seized by investigators, before eventually hiding out in an art studio in Detroit.
Jennifer’s lawyers argued that she was not trying to escape custody but feared for her life after threats were allegedly made following her son’s crime.
Their dramatic arrest in the studio was shown to jurors the day before, showing the frantic moments they were taken into custody.
On the day of the shooting, both parents were called to Ethan’s school after distorted drawings of school shootings were found on his homework. After refusing to take him home, school administrators instructed them to seek mental health care for their son within 48 hours.
But Willis testified that records from their seized phones showed they did not call doctors’ offices at mental health facilities after the meeting.
He added under cross-examination that there was no evidence the parents had seen Ethan’s diary entries before the shooting.
However, he argued that if they had seen the diary and decided to take action, he would have expected them to be charged with murder, rather than manslaughter.
“If I had proof of that, I think the charges would be different,” he said.
Oakland County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Timothy Willis (pictured) took the stand Thursday to testify about Ethan Crumbley’s parents’ response to the school shooting, saying they emptied their son’s bank account before choosing to stay at different hotels
On Wednesday, Jennifer suffered a humiliating revelation when it emerged that she was having an affair with a local fire station captain, whose testimony seemed to directly contradict what she told police investigators.
She had claimed to investigators that she and her husband were too busy at work to take Ethan home for the day of the shooting, after a teacher found distorted drawings of school shootings and murders in his homework.
However, Fire Chief Brian Meloche testified that Crumbley told him she could sneak away from work that morning to meet him.
He added that they typically conducted their secret rendezvous on weekday mornings in a parking lot across from her work.
When parents were called to Ethan’s school that morning, their decision not to take him home took center stage on Wednesday.
During that meeting, Ethan sat with his head down while an unchecked gun lay on the ground in his backpack. Within hours he had shot eleven people, killing four.
While Crumbley claimed she couldn’t help Ethan, who had also written “the thoughts won’t stop, help me” on the homework, her boss also testified against her claims.
On Wednesday, it was revealed that Fire Chief Brian Meloche was having an affair with Jennifer, and he texted her to “be careful” with what she wrote as “the FBI is involved.”
Jurors in the involuntary manslaughter trial of Jennifer Crumbley were shown disturbing drawings by mass shooter son Ethan hours before he opened fire at Oxford High School, killing four people.
Jennifer Crumbley’s former boss, Andrew Smith, testified Wednesday that she would have been allowed to leave work if she had had to care for her son, pushing back against her statements to police that she had to work while keeping Ethan at school.
Andrew Smith, the CEO of Princeton Management where Crumbley had worked, took the stand, insisting that she would have been allowed to leave work for a day if she said she had to care for her son.
He added that if she had to take Ethan to work with her, that would have been allowed as well.
When she returned to work after the alarming meeting, Smith testified that Jennifer saw Crumbley running down the hallway of their workplace later that morning, shouting about a report of an active shooter at her son’s school.
When she then left work, Crumbley texted her boss that “the gun is gone and so are the bullets” at her house, which he said he was “surprised” when the mother told her.
In another text shown in court, Crumbley told her boss: “I need my job. Please don’t judge me for what my son did.’
Smith testified that Crumbley was fired days after the shooting because she and her husband appeared to evade police by hiding in Detroit. Her lawyer argued that she fled because of threats from the public about her son’s actions.
Crumbley’s lawyers argued that the case should be admitted to court, as Crumbley’s lawyer Shannon Smith convinced Judge Cheryl Matthews to allow them, claiming Meloche had been pressured by police to accuse the mother.
“Right now, her life is more important than her dignity,” Smith said.
The ruling led to a slew of text messages being shown to jurors detailing Crumbley’s response to her son’s horrific crime.
She told her lover that she had “failed miserably” as a parent after her son was arrested for the murders.
“You didn’t do this,” Brian Meloche told her.
“Be careful with everything you type in Messenger or text message,” he later wrote. “The FBI is involved, they have access to anything and everything.”