According to a lawsuit filed by a Michigan-based attorney, Geoffrey Fieger, the school knew about many of the warning signs and failed do anything to protect the lives of students.
Ethan Crumbley allegedly brought bullet to Oxford High School the day before the shooting.
On November 29, the day before the shooting, Crumbley came into class with bullets in his backpack and then took them out and put them on full display for everyone in his class to see, the lawsuit alleges. Approximately three weeks before the Oxford shooting, Crumbley brought a bird’s head to school in a mason jar filled with yellow liquid and left it on top of a toilet paper dispenser in the boy’s bathroom, according to the newly revised lawsuit from Fieger on behalf of some of the shooting victims. RELATED: ‘You Will Get Shot’: Oxford High Student Shares Alleged Threats That Made Him Stay Home Ahead Of Shooting School officials were made aware of the display in the bathroom by students who found it disturbing, but then downplayed the significance of the situation by sending out a subsequent email saying that the building wasn’t under any threats — until he showed up with ammunition. In addition to this, Crumbley also researched ammunition on his phone that same day, according to the lawsuit, although it is unclear if the school was aware of that. Hours later, on this same day before the day of the shooting, Crumbley tweeted a chilling proclamation, saying “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds. See you tomorrow Oxford,” which the school was also made aware about. “The school was on alert about Ethan,” attorney Nora Hanna said to the Detroit Free Press in a phone interview this week, stressing school officials could have prevented the bloodshed. “There are a million things that they could have done.”
The lawsuit claims Oxford High School escalated Ethan Crumbley’s plans.
Once the school discovered that Crumbley had brought bullets into class and made that tweet, the principal got involved, but instead of going to Child Protective Services, they went straight to Crumbley himself. RELATED: ‘See You Tomorrow Oxford’: Ethan Crumbley’s Threatening Social Media Posts Ahead Of Michigan Shooting “(The principal) excited Ethan Crumbley by pulling him out of class, warning him that Child Protective Services might be called, thereby encouraging Crumbley to accelerate his timetable for murder,” the lawsuit states, adding that removing the teen from class in front of his classmates and making him sit for an hour and a half while waiting for his parents “further escalated” his plan. According to the lawsuit, they were required by law to report these instances to CPS, and they threatened to do so but never did. Fieger’s law firm, whom Hanna works for, hopes to hold the school accountable for the November 30th shooting, adding 11 new counts against school officials last Friday, accusing them of accelerating the teen’s rampage by being aware of these red flags but doing nothing about them. The revised lawsuit came after the investigation on the school had uncovered several new pieces of information about Crumbley’s lead-up to the school shooting, all of which were ignored by the school who continued to reassure students and parents alike that there was no threat to the school. RELATED: Suspected Michigan School Shooter Accused Of Posting Photo Of Victim & Images Inside Cop Car After Shooting Isaac Serna-Diez is a writer who focuses on entertainment and news, social justice, and politics. Follow him on Twitter here.
