OXFORD, Mich. – A jailhouse phone call in which the father of the Oxford High School shooter repeatedly threatens the prosecutor handling his case has been made public.
On a recorded phone call while in jail, James Crumbley made a series of threats against Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald, who was leading the team prosecuting his manslaughter case. Those threats were brought up in court, but not fully disclosed, during Crumbley’s trial in March.
The contents of the phone call were recently made public, however, following a Freedom of Information Act request, known as a FOIA. On what appears to be one call made sometime before his trial, Crumbley can be heard speaking to a woman and a man about McDonald, and how he planned to “go on a rampage” if he got out of jail.
“When I get out of here, I am [expletive] going on a rampage, Karen, yes Karen McDonald, your ass is going down, and you better be [expletive] scared.”
You can listen to part of the phone call recording in the video player up above. Warning: There is profanity throughout the recording.
Both Crumbley and his wife were sentenced this week to 10-15 years in prison each for their respective involuntary manslaughter convictions in connection with the Nov. 30, 2021, mass school shooting. Their son murdered four students and injured seven other people.
Prosecutor McDonald wrote that Crumbley views himself as a martyr after being charged in connection with his son’s crimes. Crumbley referred to himself as a martyr several times in the newly released audio tapes.
“You know, I kind of feel like a martyr -- or ‘martra,’ however you want to pronounce it,” James Crumbley said. “It’s [expletive] if they allow this stupid [expletive] to do to us what she’s trying to do based on nothing ... Here’s the thing: She never did any type of investigation before they charged us.”
James Crumbley spoke directly to the prosecutor on the call, since prosecutors were allowed to listen to his communications.
“Go ahead and report this call,” Crumbley said. “Send it to Karen McDonald, tell her how James Crumbley is going to [expletive] take her down. She will not have a law license when I’m done with her.”
Crumbley’s communications were limited during his manslaughter trial due to the threats he had made over the phone.
After he was convicted of all four counts, Judge Cheryl Matthews handed down a maximum, out-of-guidelines sentence. Matthews said Crumbley and his wife both failed to take any responsibility for their roles in the massacre at Oxford High School, even while addressing the court on the day of their sentencing.
---> Watch: What Oxford shooter’s parents said at their sentencing hearing
Similar to his speech in court, Crumbley’s statements on the call appeared to remove blame from himself and his wife and place it on the high school.
“They’re trying to blame it all on us,” James said. “They’re trying to say, ‘None of it should have happened because of you.’ It’s just too [expletive] ridiculous. It wasn’t us. It wasn’t us. It was the [expletive] school.”
Prosecutors have even agreed that they don’t believe the school staff handled the situation properly in the hours leading up to the shooting. Still, those staff members are protected by governmental immunity, and will not be facing criminal charges in this case.
Sentencing details
James and Jennifer Crumbley have been ordered to serve 10-15 years in prison for their role in the Nov. 30, 2021, shooting that left four children dead and seven people injured.
It’s the first time parents of a U.S. school shooter have ever been charged, convicted, and sentenced in connection with that shooting.
At two separate trials this year, jurors found James and Jennifer Crumbley guilty of gross negligence that contributed to the mass shooting carried out by their son. Prosecutors had long sought to prove -- and reiterated at Tuesday’s hearing -- that the shooter’s parents were grossly negligent over a period of time leading up to the shooting, and failed to intervene.
Prosecutors were ultimately able to convince the juries that the parents could have foreseen the shooting, and either took actions that they shouldn’t have, or didn’t act when they could’ve. Prosecutors argued the mass shooting was preventable, and that the shooter’s parents had the best opportunities to prevent it, including on the day of the shooting.
The evidence varied between the Jennifer’s and James’ trials, which were held in February and in March, respectively. Still, both juries agreed after hours of deliberations: Guilty on all counts.
The Crumbley parents faced a maximum prison sentence of 15 years in connection with their involuntary manslaughter convictions. The maximum sentence remains the same, despite each parent being convicted of four counts each.
The Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office recommended a minimum of 10-15 years. The parents had been lodged in jail in Oakland County for two years prior to Tuesday’s sentencing.
Michigan’s sentencing guidelines recommend a short sentence for such crimes, about 3-5 years. Oakland County Judge Cheryl Matthews said a sentence that exceeded Michigan’s guidelines was warranted in this particular case.
After listening to a series of victim impact statements, Judge Matthews declared Tuesday that the parents would each serve 10-15 years with the Michigan Department of Corrections. The parents will both get credit for 858 days -- just under two and a half years -- they’ve already served jail, Matthews said.
James and Jennifer Crumbley were both charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter stemming from the four students murdered by their son: 14-year-old Hana St. Juliana; 16-year-old Tate Myre; 17-year-old Madisyn Baldwin; and 17-year-old Justin Shilling.
Oakland County prosecutors say James and Jennifer Crumbley were negligent toward their son by failing to provide proper care when he reported having hallucinations and struggling with his mental health. Instead, the parents purchased a handgun for their son, and failed to address concerns presented by school staff leading up to the shooting, prosecutors argued.
Gross negligence in Michigan means that a person willfully disregarded the results to others “that might follow from an act or failure to act,” according to the state. In this case, the parents were accused of demonstrating a significant lack of concern about their son’s emotional state and actions, and what he might do to himself or others without proper intervention from them.
From the trials
Below are some of the top stories from the Oxford shooter’s parents’ trials this year: