Oxford School Shooter Never Asked For Help, Mom Jennifer Crumbley Testifies

PONTIAC, MI — Jennifer Crumbley said Thursday her son never asked her for mental health treatment and nothing suggested he needed help, despite text messages prosecutors claim were alarming.

Prosecutors claim Jennifer ignored alarming text messages from her son, who claimed the house was haunted and that he was seeing demons in March 2021.

"Ok the house is now haunted," Jennifer's son texted her in March 2021. "I got some videos. And a picture of the demon."

Jennifer said she didn't think her son was suffering from mental health issues and that he was bored and joking around.

"It wasn’t anything serious. It was just (my son) messing around. He’s been convinced our house is haunted since 2015," Jennifer said.

Jennifer said that her son and his friend would go to the basement with an Ouija board, and play the game as an ongoing joke about the house being haunted. She also said that she once flipped the circuit breaker off when her son and his friend were playing with the board.

James Crumbley, Jennifer's husband, also played into the game, once pretending to be electrocuted while changing a ceiling fan, Jennifer testified.

"Our house ghost, we called it," Jennifer said. "My son called it Horace. My husband called it Victoria."

Prosecutors claim the text messages were more serious than Jennifer believed them to be, and instead of paying more attention to the messages, she was horseback riding.

Jennifer said she probably didn't see the messages right away because her phone had spotty reception at the barn where she was horseback riding.

Jennifer confirmed with her defense attorney that her son sent those type of messages three times while she was at the barn horseback riding.

"He was just messing with us," Jennifer said. She said those messages weren't alarming.

Jennifer also testified that her son never asked her for mental health help, despite text messages between her son and his friend claiming he asked to go to the doctor, but his mother laughed at him about it.

Her son later said in the text thread with his friend that he wanted to go to the hospital because he was hearing voices and feeling depressed, but that his parents would be angry.

Jennifer said she noticed her son "acting kind of depressed," but thought that was because he had lost his grandmother and that he hadn't seen his friend as much.

Prosecutors are trying to prove the couple committed gross negligence leading up to the shooting. They claim the couple ignored disturbing warning signs from their son leading up to the deadly shooting, and instead of getting him help, they bought him a gun.

The couple, however, maintains that they had no idea what their son was planning. Moreover, defense lawyers argued the couple cannot be held accountable because they were not "directly involved" in the Oxford school shooting, and are not "responsible for the deaths of others."

The couple were each charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the deadly Oxford school shooting that left four dead on Nov. 30, 2021. They are being held in the Oakland County Jail on $500,000 bond each.

Their son was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in December for the deadly shooting. He has since appealed his life sentence and will not testify during his parents' trials.

James' trial will start on March 5, according to court documents.

The four students killed in the shooting were 14-year-old Hana St. Juliana, 16-year-old Tate Myre, 17-year-old Madisyn Baldwin and 17-year-old Justin Shilling.