Counselor recalls morning of Michigan school attack when parents declined to take shooter home

PONTIAC, Mich. (AP) — The parents of a Michigan school shooter declined to take their son home hours before the attack, leaving instead with a list of mental health providers after being presented with his violent drawing and disturbing messages, a counselor testified Monday.

A security camera image of James Crumbley with papers in his hand at Oxford High School was displayed for the jury.

“My hope was they were going to take him to get help,” Shawn Hopkins testified. “Let’s have a day where we spend time with you.”

But “there wasn’t any action happening,” he said.

James Crumbley, 47, is on trial for involuntary manslaughter. He is accused of failing to secure a gun at home and ignoring signs of Ethan Crumbley’s mental distress.

No one checked the 15-year-old’s backpack, and he later pulled out the handgun and shot up the school, killing four students and wounding more on Nov. 30, 2021.

On the trial’s third day, prosecutors focused on the morning of the shooting.

The Crumbleys had met with staff who gave them a drawing on Ethan’s math assignment showing a gun, blood, and a wounded person, along with anguished phrases: “The thoughts won’t stop. Help me. My life is useless.”

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Hopkins said he arranged for the Crumbleys to come to the school and met with Ethan before they arrived, trying to understand his mindset. The boy told him: “I can see why this looks bad. I’m not going to do” anything.

“I wanted him to get help as soon as possible, today if possible,” Hopkins said. “I was told it wasn’t possible.”

Hopkins testified that he told them he “wanted movement within 48 hours,” and thought to himself that he would call Michigan’s child welfare agency if they didn’t take action.

Just a day earlier, Jennifer Crumbley had been called when a teacher saw Ethan looking up bullets on his phone, the counselor said.

Hopkins said Ethan wanted to stay in school. The counselor believed it was a better place for him, especially if he might be alone even if the Crumbleys took him home.

“I made the decision I made based on the information I had. I had 90 minutes of information,” Hopkins said.

Hopkins said James Crumbley never objected when his wife said they couldn’t take Ethan home. And he said no one disclosed that a new gun had been purchased just four days earlier — one described by Ethan on social media as “my beauty.”

The Crumbleys are the first U.S. parents to be charged with having criminal responsibility for a mass school shooting committed by a child. Jennifer Crumbley was found guilty of the same involuntary manslaughter charges last month.

Ethan, now 17, is serving a life prison sentence for murder and terrorism.