Yahoo News Oxford High School shooting: Everything we know about deadly Michigan attack and suspect Ethan Crumbley
Four students were killed and at least eight others injured in a mass shooting at a suburban high school in Michigan on Tuesday afternoon.
The suspected shooter, 15-year-old sophomore Ethan Crumbley, was taken into custody by police in response to the incident at Oxford High School in Oxford Township, a community of 22,000 people 30 miles north of Detroit, and a semi-automatic handgun was recovered.
On Wednesday Mr Crumbley appeared virtually in court to hear charges of terrorism and first degree murder, to which he pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors accused him of “methodically and deliberately” firing on his fellow students.
The teenager was charged as an adult with one count of terrorism, four counts of first-degree murder, seven counts of assault with intent to murder, 12 counts of possession of a firearm in the commission of a felony. Taken together, he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison without parole if he is found guilty.
Oakland County prosecutor Karen McDonald said the charges stemmed from “undeniable” evidence that the attack was premeditated.
It was also reported that the teen and his parents had a meeting with his teachers who were concerned about his behaviour.
He also met with staff a day before the shooting, this time although without his parents.
It remains unclear what prompted the meeting of Mr Crumbley’s parents and teachers on Tuesday, hours before he allegedly went on a rampage inside the school.
However, Oakland County sheriff Mike Bouchard said on Wednesday that Mr Crumbley’s teachers had previously flagged him for “behaviour in the classroom that they felt was concerning”.
County undersheriff Mike McCabe said the suspect had not offered any resistance when he was apprehended - within five minutes of the first 911 call being received – and that a motive for the attack had not yet been established, the boy having invoked his right to an attorney and declined to speak to officers.
Investigators said he had boasted on his Instagram page about a gun that his father had purchased on Black Friday and pretended that it was his own.
It was also revealed that he had written in detail about his fantasies of doing violence to his fellow students in his journal.
Hours before he started shooting, Mr Crumbley had written on Instagram: “Now I become death – destroyer of worlds – see you tomorrow Oxford.”
During his video arraignment on Wednesday, Oakland County sheriff’s lieutenant Tim Willis told Judge Nancy Carniak that a search of the teen’s home had turned up “two separate videos recovered from Ethan’s cellphone made by him the night before the incident, wherein he talked about shooting and killing students the next day at Oxford High School”.
Because he is under 18, the suspect was initially kept in juvenile detention, but on Wednesday a judge accepted the prosecution’s request to have him transferred to Oakland County Jail because he could pose a threat to other minors.
Ms McDonald has said that the 15-year-old will be charged as an adult – and also indicated that his parents might also be charged for failing to keep the handgun away from him.
The four students killed in the shooting on Tuesday at the Oxford High School were Tate Myre, 16; Hanna St Julian, 14; Madisyn Baldwin, 17 and Justin Shilling, 17.
Myre, a popular member of the school’s football team who is said to have attempted to disarm the shooter, succumbed to his wounds in a patrol car as a deputy tried to rush him to hospital.
One of the injured victims is believed to be a teacher at Oxford High and the rest are pupils. All of the wounded were cared for in local hospitals, Mr McCabe said, with four currently still receiving treatment.
Tim Throne, the superintendent of Oxford Community Schools, told reporters: “I’m shocked. It’s devastating.”
The Oakland County undersheriff was quick to praise the institution’s actions, saying: “There was an orderly evacuation, the school did everything right. Everybody remained in place. They barricaded themselves.”
Chilling footage emerging from the incident showed students running for cover and classroom doors being barred with chairs as Mr Crumbley stalked the halls, having emerged from a bathroom at approximately 12.51pm and firing off between 15 and 20 shots from multiple magazines.
Police said he had used a Sig Sauer semi-automatic pistol that his father had bought on Black Friday, just four days earlier.
At one point in the footage captured at the scene, the shooter is seen banging on doors claiming to be a police officer in a bid to dupe people into coming out into the corridor.
Aiden Page, a senior at the school, said a bullet pierced a desk he and his peers had used to barricade the classroom door.
“We grabbed calculators, we grabbed scissors just in case the shooter got in and we had to attack them,” he added.
Other pupils later recounted stories of their teachers leading them out of harm’s way and making calls to try to determine whether the order to leave was just a practice drill or a real active-shooter incident.
Parents were told to avoid the campus and instead to meet their children in the parking lot of a nearby Meijer store.
Speaking to the Associated Press, Robin Redding, mother to Oxford 12th grader Treshan Bryant, commented: “This couldn’t be just random. Kids just, like they’re just mad at each other at this school.”
Her son added that he had not attended classes on Tuesday because he had a bad feeling about the day’s events and indicated that he had heard threats about a potential shooting “for a long time now”.
“You’re not supposed to play about that,” he said. “This is real life.”
But Sheriff Bouchard denied that threats had been received in advance, commenting: “There was no prior information shared with the Sheriff’s Office or the School Resource Officer before the incident.”
Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer issued a statement in response to the tragedy on Tuesday, offering her condolences to the Oxford community, thanking first responders and speaking out on what she called a “crisis” of gun violence.
“As Michiganders, we have a responsibility to do everything we can to protect each other from gun violence,” Governor Whitmer said.
“No one should be afraid to go to school, work, a house of worship, or even their own home. Gun violence is a public health crisis that claims lives every day. We have the tools to reduce gun violence in Michigan. This is a time for us to come together and help our children feel safe at school.”
President Joe Biden was kept abreast of the situation and said that his “heart goes out to the families enduring the unimaginable grief of losing a loved one”.
“You’ve gotta know that that whole community has to be just in a state of shock right now,” he said from Dakota County Technical College in Rosemount, Minnesota.
Local people gathered for a candlelit vigil at Lakepoint Community Church on Tuesday evening to mourn the dead, with several pictured breaking down in tears.
Meanwhile, Ms McDonald said that there was a “mountain” of evidence against Mr Crumbley so far.
“Shortly, we’ll be announcing whether or not there will be other charges,” she said. “We know that owning a gun means securing it properly, locking it and keeping ammo separate and not allowing access to others, particularly minors. We have to hold individuals accountable.”
A GoFundMe account has been created for the four victims.
An open letter that Jennifer Crumbley, mother of Mr Crumbley, wrote to Donald Trump in November 2016 has also emerged.
In a pro-gun post to her blog, she told the 45th president: “As a female and a Realtor, thank you for allowing my right to bear arms. Allowing me to be protected if I show a home to someone with bad intentions. Thank you for respecting that Amendment.”
Read More
Oxford school shooting: Gunman identified and charged with terrorism and murder
Oxford school shooting: Who are the four teens gunned down ‘at random’ by suspect Ethan Crumbley?
