On November 30, 2021, a school shooting occurred at Oxford High School in Oxford Township, Michigan, United States. Ethan Robert Crumbley, a 15-year-old fatally shot four people and wounded seven others, including a teacher, using a 9mm semi-automatic handgun. Authorities arrested and charged Crumbley as an adult for 24 crimes. Crumbley pleaded guilty to all of the charges in October 2022 and was sentenced in December 2023 to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, plus an additional 24 years.
Crumbley's parents, Jennifer and James Crumbley, were charged with involuntary manslaughter for failing to secure the handgun used in the rampage. After failing to appear for their arraignment, the parents were the subjects of a manhunt by the U.S. Marshals; they were caught and arrested in Detroit. The Crumbleys were tried and convicted separately of four counts of involuntary manslaughter and were jointly sentenced on April 9, 2024, to the maximum allowed: 15 years in prison, with the possibility of parole after 10 years.
Lawsuits were filed against the school district, Oxford Community Schools, alleging negligence by school officials towards warning signs exhibited by Crumbley leading up to the shooting. It is the deadliest school shooting by a lone shooter in Michigan’s history.
Background
Oxford High School used the active shooter drill known as ALICE (Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, and Evacuate), which uses proactive strategies to evade a gunman, such as using noise as a distraction and creating distance. The teachers were also trained to use a barrier at the base of the door called Nightlock, which was installed on every door of the school in 2017, three years before such barriers were required by Michigan law.
According to students and parents, rumors about threats of a mass shooting at the school were circulating before it occurred, prompting some students to stay home the day of the incident. Earlier that month, following an act of vandalism which included the hurling of a severed deer head from the school roof into the courtyard, school administrators published a note to parents, saying they had been investigating the rumors, but found no threat. Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard asserted that his office was also unaware of any credible threats prior to the shooting.
Shooting
Surveillance footage showed Ethan Robert Crumbley entering a bathroom and exiting it about a minute later, holding a semi-automatic handgun. Immediately afterwards, he started firing in the hallway as hundreds of students passed through, transitioning from one class to another. When the students began fleeing, he methodically and deliberately walked down the hallway and shot into classrooms and at anyone who was unable to escape until he moved on toward another classroom. Due to the quick response by students and staff, Crumbley was unable to actually enter any of the classrooms.
According to students, a voice over the intercom alerted them to an active shooter, and their teachers started locking and barricading doors and covering windows, convincing them it was not a drill. Others recounted hearing loud, banging sounds, before they realized the noises were gunshots and quickly locked the door. One student, who hid in a toilet stall, recalled hearing a gun being cocked outside the bathroom. Once the school had been secured, he opened the bathroom door to find several bodies lying on the floor.
At 12:51 p.m., police received the first of approximately 100 9-1-1 calls about the shooting and headed to the school. Within two or three minutes of first-responder arrival on the scene, Crumbley was arrested, unharmed, by a deputy, assigned as a school resource officer, and a second deputy. The assailant allegedly still had seven rounds of ammunition loaded into his gun and two 15-round magazines. At a news conference, Oakland County Undersheriff Michael McCabe said Crumbley surrendered to deputies without incident. The entire shooting lasted about five minutes and occurred in the southern end of the school building. A total of 32 spent bullet casings were found at the school.
Immediately afterwards, the school went into lockdown. Some students were evacuated to a nearby Meijer store, and one woman helped shelter children in her house. Authorities conducted three sweeps of the building in search of victims and evidence. At least one student posted a video to social media, showing people hiding in a classroom while someone out in the hallway spoke to them, claiming to be law enforcement. Those locked down in the classroom mistakenly believed the speaker was the shooter. They ultimately fled through the windows, and, from there, a deputy led them to safety. During a subsequent press conference, Sheriff Bouchard confirmed that, based on surveillance footage, Crumbley had never knocked on a door, and the person speaking from the hall was likely a detective trying to calm the students.
Victims
Three students—Madisyn Baldwin, 17; Tate Myre, 16; and Hana St. Juliana, 14—were killed at the scene, and eight other people, including a teacher, were injured. Myre was reportedly shot while attempting to stop the gunman; he died in a police vehicle en route to the hospital. On December 1, a fourth student, 17-year-old Justin Shilling, died in the hospital from his injuries.
By the night of November 30, three of the injured were in critical condition, with one on a ventilator; another was in serious condition, three were in stable condition, and the injured teacher was discharged after being treated for a graze wound to the shoulder. The last of the injured was discharged on January 17, 2022, more than a month after the shooting.
Investigation
The school was processed by investigators, with video footage from security cameras within the building as their primary focus. Officials told reporters that the cameras showed some of the actual shooting, and that Crumbley had a clear intent to kill other students, saying he fired through barricaded doors and aimed for the heads and chests of victims at close range.
A search warrant was also executed at Crumbley's home, where a cell phone, a journal, several long guns, and other items were seized as part of the investigation into the shooting and Crumbley's prior social media posts. The cell phone contained two videos of Crumbley—both filmed the night before the incident—in which he purportedly talked about his plans to shoot and kill students at the school the following day. The journal also reportedly detailed "his desire to shoot up the school," and was quoted as including: "Hopefully my shooting will cause Biden to get impeached." According to Sheriff Bouchard, as reported on December 4, investigators had spoken with Crumbley's parents during the search of their home, but not afterwards.
School response
Following public scrutiny of the school's handling of reports about Crumbley's behavior, the superintendent of Oxford Community Schools, the school district that includes Oxford High School, announced that a third-party investigation of the incident would be conducted. He also said he would recommend a review of the district's "entire system" to school board members. The office of Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel offered to conduct the investigation, but the district declined the offer. Instead, the district stated that it would use an "outside firm" for the investigation. Later, during an interview with WXYZ-TV, Nessel criticized the district's decision to hire a third party to conduct an investigation, saying she did not believe it was appropriate. She also expressed her doubts that the results of the investigation would be made public.
On December 6, prosecutor Karen McDonald said Oxford High School officials had legal grounds to search Crumbley's backpack and locker when concerns were raised about his behavior on the day of the shooting, but they never did so, for reasons which were not made clear. She also said that charges against school officials were not being ruled out. On December 8, Nessel announced her office's intent to review the actions taken by the school leading up to the shooting, despite the district turning down her offer to do so, saying, "I really do think it's incumbent upon the Michigan Department of Attorney General and the top law enforcement official in the state to conduct a further review."
Perpetrator
The shooter was identified as 15-year-old sophomore student Ethan Robert Crumbley (born April 28, 2006). He was in class on the day of the shooting.
Crumbley was placed under suicide watch after being taken to the county's juvenile detention facility. He initially maintained his right to silence.
Crumbley was born in Atlantic Beach, Florida, 15 miles (20 km) east of Jacksonville, to parents Jennifer and James, both of whom had prior minor criminal records from 1995 to 2005 for DUI and check fraud. During Ethan's childhood, both parents worked in business development and marketing, before moving the family to Issaquah, Washington, a few years later.
A former neighbor told the Detroit Free Press that, shortly after the family's subsequent move to Michigan, in 2014 and 2015, Jennifer and James often left their son home alone and without a phone as they frequented bars in downtown Lake Orion. The neighbor became so concerned that she filed an anonymous complaint by phone with the state's child protective services agency, but she did not know whether any action was taken. According to prosecutors, Ethan's only friend moved away at the end of October 2021, and the family dog died, plunging him into depression. As early as March 2021, he started sending his mother "disturbing texts about his state of mind," which included claims about "demons" and "ghosts" inside the home. He also reportedly videotaped himself torturing animals, making Molotov cocktails, and sketching himself committing a school shooting, something he also joked about with a friend via text message. At one point, Crumbley allegedly kept a baby bird's head in a jar, which he later placed in a school bathroom. His parents allegedly never sought therapy for him following any of those incidents or behaviors.
Weapon
A 9mm SIG Sauer SP 2022 semi-automatic handgun and at least two 15-round magazines were recovered from Crumbley at the time of his arrest, while a third magazine was found at the school. Bouchard said James Crumbley had purchased the gun under his own name from a local gun shop on Black Friday, four days prior to the shooting. Prosecutor Karen McDonald later said that Ethan Crumbley was with his father at the time of the purchase and that he posted about it on social media later that day. McDonald also said that Jennifer Crumbley referred to the gun as Ethan's "new Christmas present" in a social media post. Based on recovered shell casings found in the school, authorities believe at least 30 shots were fired. It was unclear how Ethan gained possession of the gun or how he brought it into the school building. In Michigan, minors cannot legally possess guns, other than within limited circumstances, such as when hunting with an adult.
Police said there was no indication that Crumbley had faced any disciplinary issues prior to the shooting. Still, Crumbley was reported to have met with school officials the day prior to the shooting, and once again early on the day of the shooting, to discuss his behavior. Prosecutor Karen McDonald later provided a timeline regarding the meetings. The first meeting occurred after a teacher spotted Crumbley using his phone to search for ammunition and reported him. During the discussion, Crumbley told them that he and his mother, Jennifer, had recently traveled to a shooting range and that "shooting sports are a family hobby." School officials left a voicemail and email for Jennifer Crumbley; she did not respond, but later texted her son, writing "LOL I'm not mad at you. You have to learn not to get caught."
The second meeting occurred on the day of the shooting after another teacher found a violent drawing on Crumbley's desk, described by McDonald in a press conference as:
A drawing of a semiautomatic handgun, pointing at the words, "The thoughts won't stop. Help me." In another section of the note was a drawing of a bullet, with the following words above that bullet: "Blood everywhere." Between the drawing of the gun and the bullet is a drawing of a person who appears to have been shot twice and bleeding. Below that figure is a drawing of a laughing emoji. Further down the drawing are the words, "My life is useless." And to the right of it are the words, "The world is dead."