Jennifer Crumbley trial opening statements focus on her parenting before son's school shooting

Clashing portraits of Jennifer Crumbley emerged Thursday during the opening statement in her trial on involuntary manslaughter charges, as prosecutors said the Michigan mother willfully failed to act before her teenage son's deadly school rampage in 2021, while her defense argued that she simply did not know what he was capable of.

In their statements, both sides focused on the events leading up to the mass shooting at Oxford High School days after Thanksgiving, when school administrators alerted Jennifer Crumbley and her husband, James, of a drawing their son, Ethan, had made of a gun and a bleeding person that a teacher found on his desk.

But Oakland County prosecutor Marc Keast told the jury that while Jennifer Crumbley shared her "private concern" with her husband in Facebook messages, she neglected to say her son had access to a gun when they met with school staff just hours before the shooting spree. Such a meeting with parents could last an hour, but Keast said the Crumbleys ended theirs after 11 minutes and the parents declined to take their son home.

"Even though she didn’t pull the trigger on Nov. 30, she's responsible for those deaths," said Keast, who began his opening statement reciting the names of the four slain students.

The Crumbleys "didn't do a number of tragically small and easy things that would have prevented this from happening," Keast added.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/opening-statements-trial-jennifer-crumbley-focus-parented-son-lead-sch-rcna135446

Yeah, like buying a son they knew was mentally ill a gun for a Christmas present.