The parents of a 15-year-old suspect in the Michigan high school shooting which saw 4 students killed have been arrested.
The Michigan high school shooting suspect’s parents were arrested after hiding out in a warehouse, and they have just been arraigned on 4 counts of involuntary manslaughter, TMZ reports.
According to the report, Jennifer and James Crumbley were nabbed after a tipster contacted police, saying their SUV was in a parking lot connected to a warehouse. Police say they appeared “very distressed” during their arrest. The police chief says they were wearing hoodies and seemed “just very upset.”
The Crumbleys have been charged with 4 counts of involuntary manslaughter — one count each for the 4 students who were murdered — and each count carries a maximum prison sentence of 15 years.
The charges are unusual and possibly even unprecedented. Authorities say the parents knew their son, Ethan Crumbley, had serious mental health issues and yet they bought him a gun just days before he shot up his school. School officials were so concerned about the boy they brought him in along with his parents just before the shooting, not knowing he had the gun in his backpack.
Ethan and his father went to a gun store the day after Thanksgiving and bought the 9-millimeter Sig Sauer handgun, which Ethan called on social media, “My new beauty.”
The Monday following Thanksgiving, a teacher saw Ethan looking up information online about ammunition, told his mother but she did not appear alarmed. In fact, she texted her son, “LOL, I’m not mad at you. You have to learn not to get caught.” The next day he shot 4 of his Oxford High School classmates to death.
The parents have pleaded not guilty.