Oxford Community Schools Faces Two $100M Lawsuits After Shooting

OXFORD, MI — Two lawsuits seeking $100 million each have been filed against Oxford Community Schools, its superintendent, Oxford High School's principal and others after four students were fatally shot and seven others were seriously wounded, a lawyer announced Thursday.

The two lawsuits were filed in Detroit federal court Thursday morning by nationally known attorney Geoffrey Fieger. Fieger filed the lawsuits on behalf of a child who was shot in the neck during the shooting rampage and her sister, who was next to her when she was shot.

On Nov. 30, four high school students were slain and six other students and a teacher were seriously hurt when, authorities said, Ethan Crumbley, a 15-year-old sophomore at the school, used a semiautomatic handgun to shoot at students while walking down a hallway at Oxford High School.

Crumbley is charged with four counts of murder and seven counts of assault with intent to murder. His parents, James and Jennifer Crumbley, are charged with four counts of involuntary manslaughter; authorities said they were caught hiding in Detroit early Saturday morning.

The lawsuit blames the school district, Superintendent Timothy Throne, Oxford High School Principal Steven Wolf, the dean of students, two counselors, two teachers and a staff member for "making the student victims less safe." The lawsuit said the defendants knew Crumbley had made threats toward the school before the shooting.

"Ethan Crumbley posted countdowns and threats of bodily harm, including death, on his social media accounts, warning of violent tendencies and murderous ideology prior to actually coming to school with the handgun and ammunition to perpetuate the slaughter," the lawsuit said.

The day before the school shooting, Crumbly also tweeted: "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds. See you tomorrow Oxford.”

When parents brought their concerns to the principal, the lawsuit said, Wolf eventually emailed parents, reassuring them that there was absolutely no threat to students at the high school.

"Defendants Throne [Superintendent] and Wolf [Principal] reviewed the social media posts of Crumbley prior to Nov. 30, 2021, which threated Oxford High School students," reads the lawsuit. "Throne and Wolf had actual knowledge of concerns from parents of students at Oxford High School as well as the students at Oxford High School."

The lawsuit also accuses the Oxford Community School District of maintaining a policy that allowed principals, counselors and teachers to return a "fully weaponized, violent child with murderous plans, back into a classroom, such that he could effectuate a massacre."

In a letter sent to staff, parents and the community Wednesday, Throne said the school district remains fully cooperative with the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office and Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office with the investigation.

Here's the letter in its entirety:

Dear Wildcat Nation,

Since last Tuesday, everyone in our community has been sharing in the grieving process, including school administrators, school employees, school board members and myself.
Since that terrible day, we have been primarily focused on helping our students, families, staff members, and community get resources to professionally trained crisis counselors and trauma therapists.

At the same time, we have been and will continue to be fully cooperative with the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office and Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office with their investigation. We haven’t been able to say more because this is an on-going investigation. We do not have all the facts and cannot interfere with the prosecutorial investigation. We know this has caused frustration and anger but we are doing our best under difficult circumstances.

After all the facts have been obtained and released through the course of the prosecution, my recommendation to our School Board will be that we initiate a review of our entire system as other communities have done when facing similar experiences.

Our goal with all of this is to bring together all of the facts of what happened before, during and after this horrific incident. We are committed to doing this in a way that allows our community to move forward and does not re-traumatize our community members, who are reeling and suffering from this horrible event.

We want you to know we will keep our community updated as this process unfolds so we can begin the healing process for our entire Wildcat Nation and move forward.

OxfordStrOng,

Superintendent Throne

The Associated Press contributed to this report.