Jennifer Crumbley, the convicted mother of the Oxford High School mass shooter, filed her official appeal on Friday, Aug. 22, alleging she was unlawfully targeted by a “cheating” prosecutor who, she maintains, abused the law in convincing a jury to wrongfully convict her for the deaths of four students murdered by her son.
And a judge let the prosecutor get away with it, Crumbley’s appellate lawyer argues in a 100-page filing with the Michigan Court of Appeals, which nearly four years after the tragedy is faced with a daunting task: Should it uphold the mother’s historic involuntary manslaughter conviction, or throw it out?
Crumbley argues the latter, and is asking the appeals court to overturn the historic conviction that sent her to prison for 10-15 years. Her husband, James Crumbley, also was convicted of the same crimes in a separate jury trial, though he’s appealing, too. The Crumbleys have long maintained that they never knew of their son’s plans to shoot up his school, never saw any signs that he was mentally spiraling, and that the gun he used was hidden in their bedroom, unloaded, with the bullets stored in a separate location.
The defense, meanwhile, believes the law is on the parents’ side.
“For as much talk as there has been about the charges in this case being unprecedented and the first of its kind in the country, this should come as no surprise given there is no legal basis to charge, convict, or sentence Mrs. Crumbley for the intentional crimes committed by her son,” Crumbley’s appellate attorney, Michael Dezsi, argues in his appeal. “This was a sham prosecution grounded in prosecutorial overreach. Having committed no crime, the court should vacate the convictions.”
“Every person convicted by a jury has a right to appeal, and we respect that Jennifer Crumbley is exercising that right.”Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said in a statement late Friday. “Our focus continues to be on the victims. We will never stop fighting for justice for Madisyn Baldwin, Tate Myre, Hana St. Juliana, Justin Shilling, and every Oxford victim.”
The Crumbleys are the first parents in America to be held responsible for a mass school shooting committed by their child. In this case, their then-15-year-old son snuck a handgun out of his parents’ bedroom, took it to school and opened fire, killing four students and injuring seven others, including a teacher. He has pleaded guilty to all of his crimes and is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole. But he is appealing, too.
Mom’s No. 1 argument on appeal: I shouldn’t have been charged to begin with
Dezsi lists many reasons for why he believes Jennifer Crumbley’s conviction should be thrown out, but the first one he lists raises an issue that criminal defense experts had argued from the get-go: That there were no legal grounds to charge the shooter’s parents to begin with.
Specifically, Crumbley’s appeal states, the mother had no legal duty to protect the victims from her son because, it maintains, Michigan law has never recognized any such duty for ordinary people. For example, a person who witnesses a store robbery or a suicide attempt they cannot be charged for failing to do anything.
Crumbley’s appeal maintains this same principle applies to her, though the prosecution has long maintained that her argument is inaccurate and misguided, and that she was convicted fair and square by a jury of her peers. As the prosecution argued to the jury repeatedly, Crumbley failed to do the “smallest” of things that could have prevented the tragedy, like put a lock on the gun her son snuck out of the house and used in his rampage; get her son mental health treatment when, it held, the boy showed signs of spiraling; bring him home from school when he exhibited troubling behavior on the morning before the shooting.
Dezsi disagrees, arguing the prosecution played into the emotions of the jury and prosecuted his client on theories that Michigan law does not support.
“As a matter of law, Mrs. Crumbley owed no legal duty to the victims of her son’s criminal acts,” Dezsi argues in his filing, adding Crumbley also had no legal duty “to control and prevent her son from committing intentional, criminal acts.”
Defense: Oxford school officials had duty to protect the students
In his filing, Dezsi also lays some blame with the school officials. He argues that even if the courts were to conclude that Crumbley did have a duty to protect the students from her son, that duty would be erased because: “her son was under the control and supervision of school officials at the time of the shooting.”
To date, no school official has ever been held accountable over their roles in the shooting.Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald has said that she found no sufficient evidence to bring criminal charges against any school officials in the Nov. 30, 2021 shooting that left four students — Tate Myre, 16; Hana St. Juliana, 14; Madisyn Baldwin, 17; and Justin Shilling, 17. — dead and injured six other students and a teacher.
The victims’ families, meanwhile, are still fighting to hold school officials accountable, maintaining, among other things, that those officials missed red flags about the shooter’s disturbing behavior, and put their children in harms way as a result.
Multiple families have filed lawsuits against the school district, though those suits have all been dismissed on governmental immunity grounds. While some cases are still pending on appeal in state court, two families each have accepted $500,000 settlements from the district to resolve their wrongful death claims.
Defense gives appeals court long list of alleged trial errors
In his plea with the appeals court, Dezsi lists multiple reasons for why he believes Jennifer Crumbley’s conviction should be overturned. His allegations include:
The defense also argues that text messages between the shooter and his friend, in which he alleged he was hearing voices and that his parents weren’t getting him help, also should never have been shown to the jury for the same reason: neither the shooter, nor his friend, were required to testify about these texts.
Dezsi also argues that the trial judge, Oakland County Judge Cheryl Matthews, erred by excluding testimony from two doctors who evaluated the shooter, and whose testimony “directly contradicted the text messages and journal entries that were erroneously admitted by the court.”
“The circuit court’s cumulative errors in admitting and excluding evidence denied Mrs. Crumbley a fair trial,” Dezsi writes.
Defense: The prosecution cheated. And the judge let them get away with it
Among the most controversial issues to surface following the Crumbleys’ convictions are the secret proffer agreements that were brokered with two school officials who testified against the Crumbleys. These agreements protected the school officials from having anything they told police from being used against them, only the defense didn’t know about them, neither did the judge or jury. The proffer agreements were first disclosed by the Free Press, days after Jennifer Crumbley’s husband, James Crumbley, was convicted of the same crimes as his wife.
Last year, Dezsi argued this withheld evidence warranted having his client’s conviction vacated or a retrial. But Oakland County Circuit Judge Cheryl Matthews wasn’t convinced, even though she concluded in her ruling that the prosecution intentionally withheld mandatory evidence from the defense..While Matthews held that “the lack of disclosure… is disturbing,” she concluded that the prosecution’s actions did not “rise to the level” to justify new trials. She also held that given the “significant” evidence facing the Crumbleys, the parents likely still would have ended up being convicted, even if they had been given the proffer agreements brokered with the witnesses.
The prosecution has long maintained that no witnesses were offered immunity, and that it was under no obligation to to turn these proffer agreements over to the defense.
Dezsi’s appeal also alleges that the prosecution engaged in a “smear campaign” by hiring two high-priced public relations firms in the wake of the shooting — one of which was retained “within hours” of the massacre — and used those firms to taint the image of the Crumbleys.
Dezsi also raised concerns about the prosecution granting exclusive behind-the-scenes access to a Washington Post reporter and a film producer — all while there was a gag order in place. The film producer turned out to be a relative, by marriage, to Oakland County Chief Assistant Prosecutor David Williams, and oversaw the making of a documentary about the Crumbleys that appeared on Netflix called “Sins of the Parents.”
Dezsi raised the issues of the PR firms and the documentary in prior pleadings, though Judge Matthews concluded those were not relevant issues and that she would not consider them in deciding whether to vacate the convictions or new trials for the Crumbleys. Rather, she said, she would only take up the prosecutorial misconduct allegations involving the proffer agreements.
Contract Tresa Baldas: tbaldas@freepress.com
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Jennifer Crumbley asks appeals court to toss verdict: ‘This was a sham prosecution’
Reporting by Tresa Baldas, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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