Ethan Crumbley, the perpetrator of the fatal shooting at Michigan’s Oxford High School, was finally sentenced to life in prison after he murdered four students and wounded seven others in November 2021.
Crumbley, who was 15 at the time of the shooting, entered Oxford High School during the morning of November 30, 2021, with a gun in his backpack and killed Tate Myre, 16; Justin Shilling, also 16; Hana St. Juliana, 14; and Madisyn Baldwin, 17.
During the hearing, where he was forced to listen to powerful testimony from several witnesses and victims, Crumbley acknowledged, “I am a really bad person. I have done some terrible things. I have lied and I’m not trustworthy. I hurt many people.”
The now-life-sentence convict further stated that he wants his classmates to “feel safe and secure” and that he is “sorry” for his actions.
The shooting occurred after the perpetrator met with school staff and his parents that same day.
“I’m going to spend the rest of my life in prison rotting like a tomato,” Crumbley wrote in his notes, which were revealed during a hearing on July 27.
The perpetrator is the protagonist of the first U.S. criminal case in which a defendant has been charged and convicted of terrorism stemming from a mass shooting.
Prosecutors argued during the hearings that the teenager deserved the maximum sentence because of his premeditation and thorough preparation to carry out the shooting.
“There was extensive planning, and … we hear that he put toilet paper in his ears to protect his hearing before the shooting,” Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said last July. “He researched and knew what kind of weapon he needed, and the one his parents already had for him was not going to do the job, so he advocated for a higher-power firearm with more deadly bullets. He practices. He went to the shooting range.”
