Parents of Michigan school shooting victims say more investigation is needed
PONTIAC, MI — The parents of four students killed at a Michigan school called Monday for a state investigation into all aspects of the 2021 mass shooting, saying the convictions of a teen and his parents are not enough to close the book .
The parents also want a change in Michigan law, which currently makes it difficult to sue the Oxford school district for errors that contributed to the attack.
“We ultimately want these to be the lessons we can learn for Michigan and the entire country,” said Steve St. Juliana, whose 14-year-old daughter, Hana, was killed by Ethan Crumbley at Oxford High School.
“But to get there, some fundamental things have to happen,” he said.
Buck Myre, the father of victim Tate Myre, said Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel “needs to stop ignoring us.”
St. Juliana, Myre, Craig Shilling and Nicole Beausoleil sat in the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office for a joint interview with The Associated Press. A jury last week convicted the gunman’s father, James Crumbley, of involuntary manslaughter.
The boy’s mother, Jennifer Crumbley, was convicted of the same charges in February. The parents were accused of making a gun accessible at home and ignoring their son’s mental distress, especially on the day of the shooting when they were called in by the school to discuss a gruesome drawing on a math assignment.
The Crumbleys did not take the 15-year-old home and school staff believed he was not a threat to others. However, no one checked his backpack for a gun and later he shot up the school.
The District of Oxford has hired an outside group to conduct an independent investigation. A report released last October said “missteps at every level” — school board, administrators, staff — contributed to the disaster. Dozens of school staff declined to be interviewed or did not respond.
The district had a threat assessment policy in place but had failed to implement guidelines that matched the policy — a “significant failure,” the report said.
Myre said a state investigation with teeth could help reveal the “whole story” of Nov. 30, 2021.
“When there is accountability, change happens,” he said. “We want responsibility and change. No parent, no school district, no child should ever have to experience this.”
The Associated Press sent emails seeking comment Monday from the attorney general’s office and the Oxford school district.
Lawsuits against the district are pending in state and federal appeals courts, but the bar is high in Michigan. Under state law, government agencies can escape liability if their actions were not the proximate cause of injury, among other things.
And because of that legal threshold, the parents said, insurance companies that reimburse schools are getting in the way of public transparency.
“The system has succeeded in holding people accountable,” Myre said, referring to the Crumbley family convictions, “but we have not been allowed to hold the system accountable.”
“That is unconstitutional,” he said. “That is an attack on our civil rights.”
Myre praised Gov. Gretchen Whitmer for meeting with parents, but said other officials haven’t listened.
St. Juliana said Michigan should create an agency to deal with school safety, as Maryland has done.
“We have to get the truth and the facts, and then we can develop the countermeasures to say, ‘How do we prevent these mistakes from happening again?’” St. Juliana said.
In addition to Tate Myre and Hana St. Juliana, Justin Shilling, 17, and Madisyn Baldwin, 17, were killed. Six students and a staff member were injured.
Ethan Crumbley, now 17, is serving a life sentence for murder and terrorism. His parents will be sentenced on April 9.
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