Hey, I'm a former Oxford student here, graduating class of 2023. I will admit it was a bit surreal seeing you cover this bc I've been watching you for four years now, but I appreciate hearing your thoughts on it because it is an important discussion. I just want everyone to remember that the victims are who truly matter, always remember the victims and make their names known. Ethan got his fleeting fame and while all of us who were there that day will live forever with what happened, live with the trauma of it we cannot ever forget who we lost on the 30th. Remember Tate, Hana, Madison and Justin, fight for justice for them and all those who we lose every day to this kind of violence.

That woman sounds like such a massive narcissist and a terrible parent. I dread the day when she tries to use the notoriety of this to get a Netflix deal.

This is the only way parents will learn.

If the parents knew that their child was having mental health issues and didn't get help for them, then yes, they should be held responsible.

Can we normalise this please? So many neglectful parents have gotten away with ignoring red flags surrounding their children’s behaviour / mental health & then have the nerve to act all shocked when they do something horrific.

I'm glad the parents are being charged. They were extremely reckless.

The first time I heard about this I got the strange feeling that they were hoping the kid would kill himself. The parents weird me out.

Saying they lost everything is so disrespectful to the victims and their families

Holy shit this screams emotional neglect on the parents part.

What you said about parents being hypocritical is SO TRUE. SO TRUEEE!!! "Mental health matters! Wait MY kid? Oh no tough it up we don't have money for therapy man up boy!"

I'm a true crime buff and i recall clearly this happening. There is so much to unpack about this family. These parents make the Columbine shooter parents look diligent. They not only bought the gun because their deeply troubled child kept badgering them to get it. Though he also badgered them for Psychiatric help and they managed to resist those pleas. But since he was too young to get one himself the father bought it. I may be wrong but I think the kid told him what kind to buy and what ammo. . His mother texted back and forth with him "joking" about doing the shooting. His teachers had called the parents in about some concerning writings he'd done. They considered that to be an inconvenience since they both had to take time off work for the conference - and then for some bizarre reason the school decided to just let him go back to class when it became obvious his parents weren't going to get him sectioned. What they did to that boy sails right past irresponsible shltty parenting and straight into outright sociopathic emotional neglect. They ought to be getting psych assessments too if you ask me.

I cried reading the article. It never gets any easier to read survivors and parents of victims talk about what happened and how it has impacted them. I think this is a good precedent. Parents need to be held accountable for not providing their kids with necessary mental health help, ON TOP of the fact they bought and kept a gun within easy access to him. It reeks of failure to parent

Heart goes out to any kid who needs to arm themselves with scissors in case they need to fight. Also the moms statements speaks volumes.

Parents, please take your kids seriously when they come to you saying theyre depressed and/or need help. I was 12 when I told my mom I thought I was depressed. She told me that I wasn't because I had no reason to be. She finally took it seriously when I ended up in a psych hospital 2 years later

Imo this is setting a great precedent. Parents have been held liable for things their kids have done before and I think it should also apply to more serious situations like this. He never could’ve done what he did without their “gift”. Edit: the mom was found guilty!!!

I remember following this story when they were still on the run and evading arrest. Given just the information that has currently been made public it is obvious that both parents were negligent and I have no doubt that replacing this pair with any normal set of parents would have saved lives. Though the son is the only one responsible for his actions, his parents should be held legally responsible for arming him with a weapon and ignoring the warning signs.

Speaking as a teacher - we have FAR too many absentee parents who think that schools are responsible for raising their kids. We're not. We're here to teach your kids academic content. We are trained to support content. Somewhere long the line we became mental health supports, food and clothing providers, etc. I have even seen a video of a pre-school teaching a kid how to wipe their butt (using balloons as the butt cheeks) come on now! That's too much. All this to say there is a lot of neglect going on and a lot of the blame game happening from parents. If more parents are held responsible like this then maybe parents will start wising up - listen to their kids, support their kids in not just their schooling but in their mental health, get them the support they need, work with the school to support them at school, and we can work together. When I told my mom at 16 I felt sad a lot and was crying with seemingly no reason, she got me therapy - not a gun.

the whole ''suck it up'' mentality is fuckin stupid, i hope newer generations grow out of that shit and help and listen to their kids for once without making fun of them for having fuckin feelings.

Im a former News Anchor and how we went about it was to mention the name once and from then on refer to them as "the shooter, the assailant, the culprit" and so on. The reson the name is mentioned once at the beginning is a point of reference. Hope that helps

There was the first school sho*ting in Serbia last year. The sho*ter was underage. Father was arrested right away, later on mother as well. If the kid is underage, parents are investigated immediately. If you have undeage kid and you provided access to a gun, which had tragic consequences, your responsibility should be investigated by default. It's wild to me that it's not the case in US.

Parents are responsible for their children. My daughter didn't have to tell me she felt unwell in her mind. I saw it in her. I got her help. Neglectful parents are in all tax brackets and they're responsible for their kids actions. Dylan kelibolds mom is to blame just the same as this set of parents are.

They neglected him, ignored his mental health issues, and purchased a gun (or "gun range time") for him. It's time for America to step up - if we have the right to own guns, then we have to be responsible for the consequences (especially for a minor/parents). Imagine being the victims parents....guilty. Period.

I think parents should also be held accountable to an extent

I wish i could remember the case's name. But there was a murderer whose mother had been a single mom in poverty who did put their kid in services and when the kid aged out, she continued to beg and plead for people to contain her child as he was such a threat. For a mother to beg for her child to be institutionalized and/or incarcerated in order to prevent them from doing harm is a massive amount of love. These parents should be held responsible. Some people are just lost causes. This was not one of them. We hold people accountable if their dogs or cars kill. We need to do the same of they dont attempt to stop their children.

I’ve been asking forever why parents are not held responsible when their child uses deadly weapons registered to them to harm other people. I hope that this not only improves weapon safety in the home, but it gives parents a reason to take their children’s mental health more seriously. Like, the amount of parents, including my own in the past, that completely dismiss their children’s mental health just because they’re young and “have nothing to worry about” is very upsetting.

it’s negligent. As someone who cried and pleaded for help and never got it until it was almost too late- this is so heartbreaking. Intervention and proper parenting could have prevented so many lives lost and destroyed.

Honestly I'm glad they're getting time. This kid literally did everything he could to try to get help and tell his family he's hurting and they straight up ignored him every time. They indirectly caused this tragedy. Of course, what he did isn't okay at all but he really tried to get help and he was rejected at every turn

In this case the parents are 100% to blame. Neglect is strong in this case. It has to go on a case by case basis

The gun was an early xmas gift for the son so, yes, I think they bear some responsibility. This happened near me so I'm invested.

12:45 she wasn't agreeing with her, she was correcting her. She said, "we lost a lot" and the judge said, "you lost everything" because the parent didn't yet realize that it truly was over for them.

Oooooh. They missed the whole context of the parents getting a call about him making a story about being a school shooter and her making a joke about the fact he can't say something like that. The gun wasn't only accessible at home, but bought specifically for her son. The parents are absolutely responsible for this.

The fact the mum was really trying to throw the dad under the bus is whats gagging me, like just because you didn't buy the gun or wasn't there when they purchased it doesn't automatically mean your not involved, you've could've forced them to return it or better yet GET HIM HELP PUT HIM IN THERAPY, even if the dad was against it, if you loved and cared for your child you would've so by any means necessary, shes just as complicit, and the fact they literally said they wouldn't change anything and wished he had killed them, just tells me they'd rather avoid any form of responsibilities and their duties as parents to get their child help

You know my dad had guns and growing up he taught us about having respect for firearms and they were always locked up in a closet with a key we had no access to. He didn’t believe in not locking them up, so when I see parents who don’t lock up their guns it baffles me

Man, this is tragic. People really hear someone say “I feel like taking my life or others” and they tell them they’re being dramatic and to chill out. This is so sad.

This is 100% the parent’s fault. They deliberately ignored their child’s plea for help and then willingly went a purchased a firearm with him present as if everything was just all fine and dandy. These parents are disgusting and should be ashamed of themselves.

I live very close to Oxford. The Crumbley’s were horrible parents and I fully believe if he had different parents this shooting would have never happened.

I mean some could argue about the unfairness of it, but the parents have to be held responsible. In this case though? The parents are 100% responsible for what happened.

See my mother used to pull the "I felt that way at your age too" crap when I was a teen. I now have a 2 year old son and it brings me to tears and makes my chest hurt at even the THOUGHT at saying that to him. That was one of the most painful things hearing my mother say to me because it felt like I was being brushed aside and ignored. I told my husband that I want to do anything and everything we physically can to make sure our son is ready for the world when he turns 18(not that we would stop helping him at that point or anything). Put him in self defense, teach him how to actually tend to his home, take care of his vehicles, teach him how to shoot and handle a "pewpew" in case there is a time and place where he needs to defend himself and a knife isn't enough. Teach him gardening and nutrition, and workout form and all that. My husband is IT. I want my husband to pass on some of that knowledge to our son when he's old enough. But above all else I want our son to know that we love him and that it is okay for a man to have emotions and that everyone experiences depression in their life at one point or another and that, that isn't the time to close off from everyone and everything you love and love you. That it's okay to have vulnerabilities. I'm not siding with the kid here. It takes a very special kinda F***ed up to hurt anything like that. And while the kid made the decisions himself, you can't look at the parents and say they did nothing wrong. Asking for mental help as a teen hurts a lot. I remember one time I went to my mother practically begging for help. I had been doing really stupid things (that I'm not going to name here) and I didn't want my baby sister to see said things happening. I was to scared to call the law on myself as I didn't want to bring that trouble to my family. I was in a hole and I felt the harder I was trying to get out the more dirt I was pulling onto myself. I felt like I was suffocating from my anxiety and depression. I managed to keep my head on straight because of my little sister. While I was a teen I couldn't stand her but at the same time I wanted to be the example on how to manage the stress, anxiety and depression. I tried my darndest to get out of that hole but couldn't get out so I forced up a wall. I acted like everything was okay and I never went to my dad as he was busy dealing with working 10 sometimes 12 hour days and anywhere from 5 to 6 days a week. He was also having to deal with my mother's expensive spending habits on top of her refusing to get a job or even doing house work(which I would say is due to depression but she's been like that for more than 30 years).

This was the Oxford Highschool incident, the weapon was an early Christmas gift according to initial articles that came out shortly after. Which makes it so much worse.

If there is grounds to blame the parents, there is grounds to blame the school. Did the school also notice he was spiralling? Did they put in place ways to support him mentally? Did he have a counsellor there?

Hopefully this case is a catalyst for other parents/adults to start taking children's mental health more seriously

So they bought that gun for the kid. His mother was posting about getting it for him as a gift. It's not uncommon for teens to know how to shoot here, hunting is big in Michigan, (I learned to shoot because my dad was a Detroit cop, though I grew up in Oakland County), but parents don't generally buy their kids hand guns. You don't hunt with hand guns. His parents drained HIS bank account and tried to flee the state. They found them hiding in an abandoned building in Detroit (in their defense, it's hard to flee Michigan since we're a peninsula). When called into the school that day they never mentioned they bought him a gun. They refused to take him home.

I'm hoping she gets time, husband as well. He was begging for help, writing crazy things, drawing pictures, saying he saw ghosts and was hallucinating. He said he wanted the world to die. So they buy a gun on Black Friday instead. Need to do something about guns, it is far too easy for something horrible to happen.

when my older brother was going through mental health issues, my parents locked away all their guns because thats what responsible gun owners do. these larents are definitely part of the problem.

Id love to hear the moms statements in context because her complaining about her christmas plans being encroached on, when her son just murdered people makes her sound wacky as hell too.

Parents always have responsibility in their childrens behavior

Parents should be held responsible to a degree!

Yes - Parents need to be held accountable. This is sadly happening far to often. Minors need their parents help when seeking mental health services since they are children and don't know how to make doctor appointments, will need access to their parents insurance, and will need help with any co-pays and meds prescribed. Parents need to provide healthcare (all forms of healthcare) for their children.

The jury is out right now deliberating in the mom’s trial right now! There are so many opposing views. I feel that the parents are responsible. The school also dropped the ball, however. Thank you for sharing this story. The trial has been heartbreaking. 💔

Hindsight is 20/20. That’s going to play a huge role in this case. Do I think this way of thinking is repulsive considering young lives were lost? Absolutely. The amount of failure to prevent this horrible act by so many authority figures is mind blowing.

8:49 bringing up the mom’s affair is wild. The only logical reason to do that is to distance the mom more from the father or to maker her look uncaring for the family overall. Either way, poor decision

Those parents are GUILTY! They ignored their son, laughed at his pleas for help, prioritized what they wanted to do over him at every turn, knew he was seeing demons and gave him a weapon! They both had jobs they could have easily taken time off from the day of the shooting and REFUSED to take him home in spite of him drawing a gun on a math test! Not only did they refuse to take him home; they didn’t tell the school what was going on with him at home, that he was hallucinating, that they had weapons in the house! We always say when these things happen, if only we knew; these parents did know and did nothing! As soon as they heard there was a shooting the mother knew it was him! Let that sink in; she immediately knew it was her son! How many more children have to die before those responsible face the consequences?

I honestly think it should be more common that the parents of minors who do this get tried. Maybe then parents would actually take their kids mental health seriously for their own self preservation. Because that's all that parents who dismiss their kids struggles like this care about anyway tbh 🤷‍♀️ even the mom throwing the dad under the bus trying to claim she had no part in it.. you absolutely did he's your responsibility since he's your kid.

Morality vs legality…I’ve been watching this trial through Uncivil Law and Recovery Addict. This is a complex case. I have lots of thoughts and I don’t think the prosecution has provided sufficient evidence to make it an easy Guilty verdict for the defendant. I find this article to be a bit misleading about the details surrounding the evidence of this case. The parents are being tried separately. But I think it’s a slippery slope. It feels like the prosecution is doing whatever they can to seek revenge. A civil suit makes sense, but I don’t think they should be criminally prosecuted for the actions of their sons. ALSO!!! Major point: the family had 2 other guns in the house. Then bought this other gun and then later he carried out his intent, which is in his notebook. I don’t blame the mother (since she’s on trial right now) for not reading his notebook. The school also didn’t really seem concerned either. Again, I would’ve done differently, as a parent. But they couldn’t call Ethan cuz he was going to plea the 5th. I don’t think there’s enough evidence. Also, her testimony was NOT good. It just feels like the prosecution is doing whatever they can to point fingers at anyone. The friend also knew what he wanted to do. How can we prove the parents KNEW he wanted to do this? I go back and forth in my head….There should be a hung jury.

LWOP for a 15 year old is CRAAAZY. california has a law against that now.

I live in Oklahoma and let me tell ya, finding mental health help is damn near impossible. There is not much out there unless you want to be admitted to an inpatient mental hospital. Very scary how little help there is.

As I watch this squatted outside of a church, I've realized my entire body into my heart rate absent mindedly.

OooOOooOoooooO that green is stunning on you!!!!

I saw something about this but wasn’t sure of any details, thank you!!

Maybe it shouldn't be typical for parents to be criminally responsible like this, but one wonders if the possibility wouldn't overall improve things. Legally it seems like nothing can regulate gun ownership. Maybe the right answer is framing it as a choice people make to take on a legal risk as big as the risk the community is taking on by allowing minors to own guns.

I'm sure others have said this, but, if they were aware of his mental health issues, did not get help for him and gave him access to the gun then yes, they're absolutely partly responsible for the outcome of that.

He'll turn 21 in prison doing life without parole... !

When keeping the full picture in mind, talking about mental health, his age, etc. I hate how we always have to use qualifiers like “it doesn’t excuse his actions.” Like no sh*t. Can ppl have conversations that are important like adults with brains for once instead of hearing buzzwords that trigger their knee jerk reactions? Of course keeping the entire picture in mind doesn’t mean you’re excusing or lessening the gravity of the situation, I do t think we need to keep qualifying ourselves. If you can’t see that, I don’t think you’re mature enough or have the mental capacity to be having the discussion. Some things are obvious, like not advocating for violence because you’re taking all the details into account.

This reminds me of Brenda Spencer, a mass shooter from the 70´s. Her father bought her a rifle for Christmas and she shot up an elementary school the following January. Her father was never convicted of any wrong doing or involvement with the massacre though.

This is such a sad case. I remember being 16/17 and going to my mom and telling her that I needed help and needed to talk to a therapist or else I felt like i would take my own life. She found me a therapist immediately. I feel like if they would've gotten him help like he asked, those victims would've been alive today. Yes at the end of the day he's responsible for his own actions and at the same time, he couldve gotten help...

ive heard people say "the shooter/killer/attacker" or just using a letter instead of naming the shooter

This is a topic that I rly care about and I feel like no one talks about! I believe they should be held accountable.

Even if a kid didn't do something this extreme, if it's found that parents refused to give mental healthcare to a child that's clearly child neglect and a crime in itself. The childs actions shouldn't save the parents guilt for that, regardless.

They put the gun in the bag. They threw him away that day…you gotta sympathize with the kid on some level, imagine trying to get help and nobody listens. They should be charged, a child has no right owning a gun! I can’t wait until the skewl lawsuit!

I think neglect would be absolutely applicable. Manslaughter is kinda insane imo

My hometown’s school shooter has been deemed incompetent to stand trail for 6 years. I can’t help but think of the families of the 10 that lost their lives. Do they think these families will ever be competent? Hell, they don’t even get to know if their child died immediately, or suffered. All because he is incompetent. 6 years now of not knowing. No answers. Just a closed casket.

I live in Michigan, and didn't even know about this. I guess I just tune it out. It happens so often.

This happened about 45 minutes away from me.

This reminds me of the movie ‘We need to talk about Kevin’. Even down to the bow and arrow they bought for Kevin. All the signs were there.

Thanks for covering this! I'm glad the parents are being tried criminally, I've been following the court proceedings and went to a school district right next to Oxford. The procecution was trying to frame her affair as she was more preoccupied with her personal life and not her son.

There's negligence and then there's this. Buying a disturbed child a gun requires a level of appallingly poor judgement i can't wrap my head around

Why is he in jail and not a hospital?

This is wild, and not in a good way.

Loving the space girl look. The green and silver is working.

what stuck out to me in particular was the mother of the shooter said she would not do anything differently, really?! Maybe she should have listened to her son when he was struggling, she could have gotten him help sooner, protested more when it came to the gun and not be more concerned about a Christmas tree of all things (the fact that she had the nerve to bring that up is baffling to me) Obviously we can't know if things would have ended differently if these things had been done but they're at least a few things she could have considered when answering that question at least.

he bought ethan the gun as an early christmas present so they could go to the shooting range together. the empty case was found on the parent's bed.

This case is very similar to a german case, where the parents were held accountable as well

I have been watching this trial daily in real time. She straight up said that she wouldn't do anything different. Also if you ever check out the body cam footage of them being arrested, no joke; they were tossed in the police cruiser right as September by Earth Wind & Fire came on the car radio in the cop car.

60 years is harsh unless they actually knew he was serious about committing the shooting. Simply not recignizing the seriousness dosplays poor judgment and self absorption, but neither are crimes. Shifting blame up the family tree would never end, ss every terrible parent probably had terrible parents themselves, plus none of these mental health issues were even known to previous generations.

I think yes. It will incentivise parents to raise their children properly and provide adequate support.

Not just ignored their son’s mental health, they left that kid out dry and ran away!!!! That to me is their admission they are at fault. #scumofbottomofsewer It’s sad to that he got life without parole. I feel he could possibly be rehabilitated with mental help and being away from his parents. He wanted help before.

It’s about time parents had some accountability in these situations. You know there is something off your child but have accessible weapons.

it's not a 'longstanding argument', Park Dietz has been begging people not to do this for decades and he is the expert

When you talked about the kids arming themselves with scissors I started crying, that is so heart breaking

Im not defending the dad at all. But here in the south a gun is an impulse buy sometimes. Idk how it is anywhere else.

The fact it happen in my state and i know my friends bf had a brother that was there thst day

I grew up nearby. This area has more gunstores than gas stations. Its not just this family.

The only thing I can think is that they were hoping he would kill people. Knowing he had serious issues and then deliberately buying him a gun.

Thank you for your videos 🙏

I don't think the parents are always to blame but in thid case its pretty clear that they are responsible for what their child did.

Unrelated to the video, I absolutely LOVE the hat! Where'd you get it?!? My mom and I were watching the video, trying so hard to make out what the label says 😂

My parents exactly. When i was a teenager struggling severely they would not let me get on medication even tho i had a chemical imbalance in my brain. As an adult, i am medicated and i am FAR more functional than i would be without it. When im unmedicated, my anxiety peaks, and i get severely depressed the longer and more severe my anxiety peaks.

It depends imo. Watching testimony I didn't hear that he asked his parents, only that he lamented in his journal. In this case, I'm undecided bc the facts aren't clear. In general though, parents don't usually have control over who their child is. If prosecution can show willful ignorance or negligence, then yes the parents are guilty of something. Yet it still leaves the systemic issue open and unaddressed.

I think the parent should be punished for something like negligence because yeah, the guns were unsupervised near minor… but I don’t know how I feel about parents being punished for their kids crimes. I’m worried about how that’s going to change parenting. If a child commits a crime, and the parents get charged for that crime, I don’t see many parents allowing their kids to do anything independently of them if they know that their own freedom is at risk. I truly believe that would just lead to a bunch of sheltered children locked inside until they’re 18. Making a bunch of rebellious adults. Something needs to be done , I just don’t know if this is it.

normally i’m not a big fan of those brows, but they look so good on u!!!!