Do you think the Crumbley parents are legally innocent?

Noyankee wrote:

carmine9 wrote:

If the kid is being charged as an adult, which he is, then how can you also blame his parents.

The Prison State expands its power over the regular people.

Meanwhile the drug addicted kid of billionaire racist Donald Sterling murdered his friend and did not even get charged with it, never mind his father being indicted.

Draconian laws for us.

No laws for the elites.

https://www.insideedition.com/8212-donald-sterlings-son-shot-best-friend-escaped-charges

GREAT point. Did not consider that angle and that is true. If they are charging him as an adult, then the parents have no blame as long as they are lawful gun owners

So if I commit a crime, the fact that I'm an adult means that no one else can be charged in connection with the same crime? I'm not following the logic, here.

I don't know whether or not the parents did anything illegal, but charging the shooter as an adult doesn't really have anything to do with it. If I provide a gun to a guy who lives down the street from me and he uses it to kill someone, my legal culpability has nothing to do with whether the shooter is charged as an adult.

well this wrote:

Do you think that they may have been bad parents but didn't break any laws and are just being singled out by antigun liberals?

Nice try to spin this into a political issue, dufus.

I own guns. The parents were horrible. Buying a gun for a disturbed kid. The mother, saying to the kid while shopping for ammo at school, "I'm not mad at you, just don't get caught net time."

Incidents like this irritate the hell out of me because they make gun owners that are careful and that abide by the law, look bad. Most responsible gun owners want to see the parents prosecuted.

I'm pro-gun ownership, almost advocate it for everyone, but it entails a lot of responsibility. If I'm on that jury (thinking about what I would've done as a parent had I been called in to meet with my kid and school counselor under those circumstances and KNOWING I had an unsecured gun at home that was implicitly his), there's no way I find the parents not guilty of involuntary manslaughter. They had a responsibility to take the kid home as the school requested and/or to at least mention the gun so they could've tried to locate it immediately. Even if that was the first time they knew their kid was "disturbed," they still had an obligation to divulge that information. They didn't and only acted once they knew the shooting had already happened.

That they tried to flee (I don't blame them here, they were rightly scared about their own safety) isn't a big deal to me, but if the foreman of the jury did a roll call, I'm saying they're guilty and there's no way I'm changing my mind. They need to be held accountable to hinder this BS in the future. Maybe the prosecution gets the kid to flip on the parents and is only charged as a minor. This entire thing is so sad, just unbelievable criminal negligence, and lives were lost as a result. Lock them up.

The mother texted her son "don't do it" when news of the active shooter situation went public. Let that sink in. Her first thought was not, "Is my son OK?" Not a fear that some maniac is shooting up her son's school. Her first thought was that she knew it was her son, and texted him, asking him not to shoot people. Not even enough urgency to call the kid; she just texted him.

try harder wrote:

well this wrote:

Do you think that they may have been bad parents but didn't break any laws and are just being singled out by antigun liberals?

I own guns. The parents were horrible. Buying a gun for a disturbed kid. The mother, saying to the kid while shopping for ammo at school, "I'm not mad at you, just don't get caught net time."

Their case is pretty egregious, how ever I do wonder if the government will be willing to go after parents who's kids are known violent criminals.

Will they go after the parents of gangbangers? Kids that have a history of violent behavior, gun ownership/possession? Does this every happen?

try harder wrote:

well this wrote:

Do you think that they may have been bad parents but didn't break any laws and are just being singled out by antigun liberals?

Nice try to spin this into a political issue, dufus.

I own guns. The parents were horrible. Buying a gun for a disturbed kid. The mother, saying to the kid while shopping for ammo at school, "I'm not mad at you, just don't get caught net time."

Incidents like this irritate the hell out of me because they make gun owners that are careful and that abide by the law, look bad. Most responsible gun owners want to see the parents prosecuted.

Yet you didn't understand or were afraid to answer the question. Should the parents be charged? (Don't restate the obvious, that were things they should done. Everyone agrees with that)

carmine9 wrote:

If the kid is being charged as an adult, which he is, then how can you also blame his parents.

The Prison State expands its power over the regular people.

Meanwhile the drug addicted kid of billionaire racist Donald Sterling murdered his friend and did not even get charged with it, never mind his father being indicted.

Draconian laws for us.

No laws for the elites.

https://www.insideedition.com/8212-donald-sterlings-son-shot-best-friend-escaped-charges

That he is being charged as an adult is irrelevant. The upgrade of the charge doesn't change the fact that he was a minor at the time. Keep in mind that lesser punishments for minors aren't even required. They are used as a rough demarcation based on assumptions regarding the development of mature thought. Ethan's own writings showed the capacity to form a plan to kill and understand that his actions would kill, so the upgrade in charges is appropriate.

In this case the parents bought a gun and didn't secure it from a troubled minor. They had the ability to search his backpack, they had the ability to pull him out of school. They had the ability to get him counselling. Whether this all amounts to manslaughter under Michigan law is yet to be determined. But it is worth charges.

Adding in bad checks and DWI, these people are scum. I doubt any community would want them as residents after this, assuming they beat the charges.

I don't think Michigan has a secure requirement for gun owners so that may go nowhere. It is a very slippery slope to charge parents for the behavior of their children and too many are too quick to immediately blame parents when their kids go off the rails.

Having said that, this case may be one where there should be charges brought forward in some fashion.

As to the school....I'm less inclined to place legal criminal blame here as I think the only thing that could have been done once the parents refused to take him were to have been to bring in police and have him held. He could not have been sent off campus I don't believe as he is 15 and the school at that point has legal responsibility for him.

They're far from innocent.

Not only did they fail to safely secure a gun they own, but they actively ignored major red flags for months on end. Their son is severely mentally ill. Both his parents and school administrators actively ignored a plethora of red flags that something was coming.

In fact, the morning of the shooting, Ethan's teacher found his notebook with a drawing of the gun he later used with a note that said something similar to "The thoughts won't go away. Please help me". School administrator's pulled Ethan out of class and called in his parents. They told the parents that they needed to get Ethan out of school and into counseling within 48 hours. The parents said no, then left school without him. The school administrators sent Ethan back to class. Less than three hours later, he'd opened fire and killed three students, and a fourth later died from their wounds. A half hour after Ethan had opened fire, his mother texted him "don't do it."

If you think his parents are at all innocent in this, you're ignorant and delusional. And if you think Ethan, a severely mentally ill 15 year old kid, should be tried as an adult, then you are similarly delusional and have no empathy.

I assume most of the posters know this but I did not see it listed in any post. Neighbors have publicly stated that the boy came to their house on many occasions. To find a meal or just someone to talk to since his parents were out bar hopping most of the time. That is sh!tty parenting.

As someone wrote, I don't think Michigan has a secure your gun law, so it will be real hard for the parents to be prosecuted. I think it will be interesting to see if gun advocates and/or the NRA pay for top of the line legal representation for these sh!t-for-brain parents.

I agree with most, charge them, and let it play out from there.

NotPC wrote:

Their case is pretty egregious, how ever I do wonder if the government will be willing to go after parents who's kids are known violent criminals.

Will they go after the parents of gangbangers? Kids that have a history of violent behavior, gun ownership/possession? Does this every happen?

Fair point. Parents have only so much they can do to control their children's behavior. I would not want that legal responsibility broadly applied.

But I think it's clear that this case is different in that the parents BOUGHT THE MURDER WEAPON FOR HIM. They KNEW he had it AND did not make ANY EFFORT to curtail his access to it. It's also fair to say that they probably suspected he had it with him at school (see mom's text) and then WALKED OUT of the school without any type of intervention or indication to the school that he had a gun and free access to it.

It's not a slippery slope. At all.

well this wrote:

Do you think that they may have been bad parents but didn't break any laws and are just being singled out by antigun liberals?

Lets be honest, severe disabling mental health issues aside, you can be a lot of things as a troubled teenager--runaway from home, trying drugs, behavior issues, bad grades.... But to shoot people dead in cold blood takes a team effort. Nobody shoots up a school that has any feelings at all of being loved or valued. Im not sure yet whether I support horrible parents being a crime (although im gettin there), but you buy a gun for a kid with severe issues, you are as liable as anyone.

Typical for conservatives to stick up for the parents though. If a gun was involved it must have been all good right? Because guns is awesome.

I don’t care about the second amendment or use the phrase “anti-gun liberals” pejoratively.

That said, charging his parents is a legal stretch. There are no laws requiring acting to prevent a crime as opposed to standing and watching it happen. They need to prove that the parents intended for it to happen to get them on aiding and abetting charges. For involuntary manslaughter, they need to demonstrate culpable negligence, culpable being key, that their negligence in allowing him to possess a weapon caused him to commit the crime. They can’t simultaneously try him as an adult and also hold his parents accountable for his thoughts and actions.

They can and will get the parents on the charge of allowing a minor to possess a gun.

I'm skeptical of the legal theory that are being charged under, and skeptical of the district attorney's motives in charging them. As a fairness matter, the Crumpley's lives were shattered by what their son did and all the consequences of that. Bringing these novel kinds of charges just based on various statements, most of them by the school officials/counselors who are trying to cover their own mistakes, seems like hitting someone when they are down, just for the district attorney's own media publicity.

There are a LOT of facts that none of us know yet (and yet in the posts above, many posters assume they know it all -- e.g., "the gun wasn't secured"). What is being reported in the usual media sources -- sources that we know from unfortunate past experiences are often wrong and biased --- is nothing more than a flawed summary of what the district attorney said at that publicity stunt of a press conference. We won't know what really happened, and the timeline in which it happened, for many months/years. Of course, by then most of the media has embalmed its story and the public has already made up their mind (like many posters in this thread).

500,000.00 bail for that? Ridiculous...

Liberal. anti gun mob again over-reaches because they are so emotionally overwrought..

Good point but I think you explained why the specifics of the case dictate that this will NOT be a broad application.

The most damning thing in this case is that all the important players(kid, parents, school admin) we in a room earlier in the day and we still ended up with a tragedy.

Can anyone answer:

In MI can schools force parents to remove their child/take them home for disciplinary reasons? What's the due process? Does it involve LEO.

In MI what are the statutory responsibilities of parents when it comes to their minor child threatening and then causing harm to others?

bigmig19 wrote:

well this wrote:

Do you think that they may have been bad parents but didn't break any laws and are just being singled out by antigun liberals?

Lets be honest, severe disabling mental health issues aside, you can be a lot of things as a troubled teenager--runaway from home, trying drugs, behavior issues, bad grades.... But to shoot people dead in cold blood takes a team effort. Nobody shoots up a school that has any feelings at all of being loved or valued. Im not sure yet whether I support horrible parents being a crime (although im gettin there), but you buy a gun for a kid with severe issues, you are as liable as anyone.

Typical for conservatives to stick up for the parents though. If a gun was involved it must have been all good right? Because guns is awesome.

I'm conservative, and in no way have I or am I exonerating the parents. This was extreme criminal negligence on their part, in my opinion, and they should be indicted and hopefully convicted.

However, many of my liberal friends are either suffering from mental illness or have children who are. They are the first ones to bash gun owners and advocates. Whenever I suggest that one of the best things we can do for gun control is to find a way to navigate around HIPAA, see who is really mentally ill, on psychotropic meds, etc and find a way to restrict access here, they put up a raging fight that that is merely a conservative talking point, ignoring the fact that 90% of these shootings are committed by mentally ill individuals, usual on one or more psychotropic meds. I think the fight stems from the fact that they themselves are mentally compromised, on psychotropic meds, and, therefore, take it very personally.

But that doesn't change the facts. You don't go shooting others in cold blood if you are of sound mind and not drugged. The dumbfukk parents bought the gun and gave the kid access. That's another entire level of stupid and I don't know how you prevent that from happening. This is why the parents should be made an example of here. It sends a message that needs to be sent.

No, the Crumpley's lives were shattered by a horrible situation that they perpetuated and enabled. All preliminary evidence points to the fact that there warning signs and red flags for months leading up this. His parents and school administrators ignored the signs. His parents got him a gun as a gift. If you doubt that they got it for him, his mother posted a picture of the gun on social media calling it his Christmas present. When a teacher raised alarm at him searching for ammunition on the internet, his parents didn't respond to voicemails or emails from the school, and his mother texted him regarding the incident "LOL I'm not mad, you just have to learn to not get caught". When his parents were called into school regarding a disturbing drawing in his notebook, they refused to remove him from school and put him into counseling. They then left school without him and less than three hours he opened fire on his fellow students. If you hear this and think that the parents are in any way innocent, you're completely delusional.

Agree. 100%.