Why Prosecuting Mass Shooters’ Parents Will Help Curb Gun Violence

The Oakland County Courthouse in Pontiac, Michigan, where Jennifer Crumbley was tried and convicted of involuntary manslaughter in February 2024. Photo by OZinOH. 

Since Columbine in 1999, thousands of students have experienced the traumatic emotional and physical impacts of gun violence, which has increased sharply since 2021. To mitigate future harms, attorneys are now focusing their energy on a novel strategy for punishing gun violence perpetrators: prosecuting their parents. 

Previous legal strategies to reduce gun violence have included suing gun manufacturers, seeking redress from school administrators for the failure to identify at-risk students, and holding law enforcement accountable for slow emergency response. Following the 2021 Oxford High School shooting, prosecutors took a different route. In addition to prosecuting Ethan Crumbley, the Michigan teenager who killed four students and consequently received a life sentence without the possibility for parole, the state also prosecuted his parents, Jennifer and James, both of whom were sentenced to 15 years of prison.

This strategy has been attempted before against the parents of school shooters, such as with Deja Taylor, who was sentenced to 21 months in prison for pleading guilty to a charge of felony child neglect after her six-year-old accessed her handgun and shot his elementary school teacher in Virginia in 2023. However, the Crumbleys’ case creates a new precedent, as it is the first time two parents have been convicted in connection to a mass school shooting committed by their child. 

In Jennifer’s trial, prosecutors argued that she neglected her duties as a parent specifically by prioritizing time with her horses and extramarital affair over her son and neglecting his clear need for mental health care. Most importantly, the prosecution noted that the semi-automatic pistol Ethan used in the shooting was a present bought by his father and that his mother took him to a shooting range with it a few days before the mass shooting. The historic case against the Crumbleys is not just about their son’s access to a gun in their household, but how they unconsciously played a direct role in their child’s fatal actions.

In her instructions to the jury in Jennifer’s trial, judge Cheryl Matthews explained that Michigan state law establishes that parents have a duty to reasonably care for their minor child to prevent them from posing a threat of harm to themselves and others. As seen with Jennifer’s prioritization of personal activities, prosecutors showed that Jennifer did not meet the requirements detailed in the state law. Additionally, the jury concluded that Jennifer failed to perform her legal duty as a parent, finding her guilty on all four counts of involuntary manslaughter—one count for each child Ethan murdered. 

This new prosecutorial strategy presents legal and social ramifications for parents as it changes how they engage in their child’s life. A 2020 study found that half of mass school shootings are committed by current or former students, and 76% of school shooters have accessed a firearm from the house of a parent or relative. Additionally, a 2009 study found that parental neglect had one of the strongest links to delinquency in children and that poor support by fathers has a greater impact on sons than poor support by mothers. This could possibly explain, though not justify, Ethan’s criminal behaviors. In light of this research, parents may be more incentivized to participate in their children’s lives to prevent these crimes. If parents are now held responsible in criminal court for their child’s mass shooting, they may be more mindful of the presents they buy them and the actions they teach their children, take their children’s mental health more seriously, and enact a safer gun storage system in their household. Parents may also not want to see their children imprisoned or see other children die at the hands of their own child. If caring for their child on the basis of being a good parent is not enough to motivate parents, then the Crumbleys’ convictions might further invoke parents to help their children in times of crises because they might face criminal charges if they fail to intervene. 

Pro-Second Amendment groups frequently frame the nationwide rise in gun violence as an issue of mental illness, not gun abuse. There is some truth here, as 60% of gun deaths in the United States are suicides, pointing to a possible link between mental illness and gun ownership. However, to categorize all gun deaths or mass shootings as the result of mental illness stigmatizes mental health and simplifies the complex nature of gun violence. In 2020, about 20% of adults in the United States suffered from mental illness, the majority of whom are never violent. Additionally, most homicides are not linked to mental illness. There should not be a conflation of the mentally ill and gun violence. Thus, mitigating gun violence through mental illness intervention is not as effective as tackling the issue of gun violence head-on, which prosecutors in the Crumbleys’ cases tried to do. 

In the United States, gun violence is a growing epidemic as over 100 people are killed daily with guns. Either through legal or legislative channels, deterring gun abuse should be a top priority for all politicians and advocates. Recently, federal gun safety legislation has been successfully proposed and passed to curb this epidemic and allow parents and their children to feel safe at school—a fundamental feeling that every child should have a right to. Enacted in June 2022 as a response to the deadly Buffalo and Uvalde mass shootings from the preceding month, the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act includes provisions to increase community safety, such as by enhancing background checks for those under the age of 21 who purchase a firearm, supporting state “red flag” laws intended to bar individuals deemed a danger to themselves or others by a court from purchasing a firearm, and expanding protections for victims of domestic violence. At the state level, governors  have signed “sensitive locations” legislation to restrict where firearms can legally be carried, such as in schools. While this progress is notable, more legislative requirements on gun ownership and criminal penalties for abusing one’s gun ownership need to be done to drastically reduce gun violence in schools.

By creating new legal strategies, advocates hope to ensure that the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are not trampled in pursuit of the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. The Crumbleys’ cases are evidence that parents can now successfully be held accountable and convicted for their child’s deadly actions, and that serves as an important lesson for all parents who have not adequately cared for their children. Thus, by widening the circle of responsibility, prosecutors have established another method of mitigating the gun violence epidemic.

Charla Teves (BC ’25) is a staff writer at CPR studying political science and anthropology. She is passionate about social justice and hopes to highlight new strategies to tackle current issues in her writing. She can be reached at ct3132@barnard.edu.