5 cases in which parents were convicted after a shooting by their child
A jury ruled Thursday that James Crumbley was partially responsible for the deadliest school shooting in Michigan history. Mr. Crumbley’s son, Ethan, killed four people and injured another seven at Oxford High School in suburban Detroit on Nov. 30, 2021.
Ethan Crumbley, who was 15 at the time of the shooting, later pleaded guilty to 24 charges, including first-degree murder, and was sentenced last year to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Mr Crumbley’s wife, Jennifer, was convicted last month of identical charges of involuntary manslaughter. They were the first parents in the country to be directly charged for the death caused by a child in a mass school shooting.
Here’s a look at their case and others in which parents have been found criminally liable after a shooting by their child.
Oxford High School, Michigan, 2021
Ms. Crumbley, 45, was convicted Feb. 6 of four counts of involuntary manslaughter, one for each of the four students who were killed. She and her husband had given their son the gun he used in the shooting as a gift.
Ms. Crumbley faces a maximum prison sentence of 15 years; the verdict is scheduled for April 9.
The landmark verdict in her case was based on evidence including text messages and accounts of a meeting with school officials just hours before the shooting, which jurors found should have known her son’s mental state. Ethan did not testify in his parents’ trials.
But in the case of 47-year-old Mr. Crumbley, testimony focused more on the Sig Sauer pistol he bought his son as an early Christmas present just four days before the shooting.
Highland Park Fourth of July Parade, Illinois, 2022
Robert Crimo Jr. pleaded guilty to seven felony counts of reckless endangerment for his role in helping his son possess firearms, including a high-powered rifle that authorities say was used in an attack on the Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Illinois. , in 2022.
His son, Robert Crimo III, is accused of killing seven people during the parade. He was 21 years old at the time, has pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial.
In Illinois, which has some of the strictest gun restrictions in the country, most firearm owners must first obtain a gun permit, called a firearm owner identification card, issued by the Illinois State Police. Mr. Crimo sponsored his son’s FOID card.
The older Mr. Crimo, prosecutors said, ignored clear signs that his son was capable of violence: In 2019, months before the gun permit was obtained, a family member contacted authorities and reported that the younger Mr. Crimo had threatened to ‘kill’. everyone.” Police officers removed sixteen knives, a dagger and a sword from the house, but decided there was no probable cause to arrest him at that time.
Robert Crimo III later purchased several weapons, including a high-powered rifle. On July 4, 2022, he climbed onto the roof of a building in downtown Highland Park, Illinois, and opened fire on the parade crowd, authorities said.
His father was given a 60-day jail sentence, but he got it issued halfway – along with two years of probation and 100 hours of public service. He had to surrender his own weapons, ammunition and his license to possess firearms. And he is not allowed to sponsor an application for a gun permit.
Richneck Elementary School, Virginia, 2023
Deja Taylor, 26, mother of a 6-year-old boy who shot his first-grade teacher in a classroom, was sentenced Dec. 15 to two years in prison after pleading guilty to child neglect.
She was previously sentenced to one year and nine months in prison after pleading guilty to using marijuana while possessing a firearm and making false statements about drug use. Federal law prohibits addicted or “illicit” drug users from owning a gun. The two sentences will be served consecutively.
The shooting occurred on Jan. 6, 2023, when the child, a student at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News, Virginia, grabbed the gun, pointed it and shot his teacher, police said. The teacher, Abigail Zwerner, was seriously injured by the single bullet that passed through her hand and hit her chest.
The child, who has not been charged, is in the care of his great-grandfather.
Waffle House restaurant, Tennessee, 2018
Jeffrey Reinking, the father of a man who shot and killed four people and injured four others at a Waffle House in Nashville in 2018, was sentenced last year to 18 months in prison for illegally providing his son with a gun used in the shooting.
Travis Reinking, who was 29 at the time of the attack, was already known to authorities. In Illinois, where he lived most of his life before moving to Nashville, police revoked his firearms license and ordered his weapons turned over to his father.
Police said the elder Mr. Reinking returned the guns to his son, allowing him to commit the murders. One weapon, an AR-15, was used in the shooting. Officers had informed Jeffrey Reinking that “he may want to lock the guns back up until Travis gets mental help.” Mr. Reinking had said he would, police said.
Travis Reinking, who suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, was found guilty of first-degree murder in 2022 and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Marysville Pilchuck High School, Washington, 2014
A federal jury in Seattle convicted Raymond Fryberg, of illegally possessing six firearms, including a Beretta that his 14-year-old son used to kill four classmates and himself. Although the elder Mr. Fryberg was not charged in the shooting, he was sentenced to two years in prison.
Investigators determined that a prior restraining order against the father should have prohibited him from purchasing the gun, but the order was never entered into the federal database.
His son, Jaylen, took his father’s gun to school in his backpack and then opened fire on a group of classmates he had texted to meet him, authorities said. He shot five classmates, four fatally, before turning the gun on himself.