Chris Lange, FISM News
Michigan school officials are facing stunning accusations that they destroyed key evidence concerning the Nov. 30 Oxford High School shooting that left four students dead and six students and one school employee injured.
U.S. District Judge Terrence Berg on Friday ordered Oxford High School Superintendent Timothy Throne and Principal Steven Wolf to preserve any and all information related to the shooting and restore deleted profiles and other evidence allegedly destroyed or deleted. The request was made by Attorney Nora Hanna, who represents sibling survivors Riley Franz, 17, and Bella Franz, 14, in a lawsuit filed against the district and several employees. Among the missing evidence cited in the filing are a LinkedIn profile of one of the named defendants and a list of high school administrators allegedly removed from the school’s official website.
“Not only did defendants fail to take necessary steps to preserve the evidence, but they willfully destructed [sic.] the evidence by deleting the webpages and social media accounts,” Hanna wrote. “Plaintiffs cannot continue to be blindsided by the defendants by having to search for what evidence is being destroyed or altered.”
Hanna and Attorney Geoffrey Fieger are seeking $100 million on behalf of the Franz family, including the girls’ parents Jeffrey and Brandi Franz, in companion lawsuits brought against the school district and employees whom they say “created the danger and increased the risk of harm that their students would be exposed to” ahead of the shooting. Riley Franz was shot in the neck during the attack while Bella “narrowly escaped the bullets discharged towards her.”
The alleged gunman, 15-year-old Ethan Crumbley, has been charged with one count of terrorism causing death, four counts of first-degree murder, seven counts of assault with intent to murder, and 12 counts of possession of a firearm in the commission of a felony. His parents, James and Jennifer Crumbley, face four counts of involuntary manslaughter each following their Dec. 4 apprehension, which followed an extensive manhunt that ensued when the two failed to appear for a Dec. 3 arraignment hearing.
Crumbley allegedly carried out the massacre with a semi-automatic pistol his parents purchased for him as an early Christmas present four days prior to the deadly shooting, according to Reuters.
Lawyers for the Oxford School District called the allegations set forth in the lawsuits “baseless.” Timothy J. Mullins, representing the Oxford School District, said the LinkedIn account referenced by plaintiffs belongs to a former employee who left the district over a year ago, adding that allegations against the person in question are false. In a statement provided to The Detroit News, he referred to the lawsuits as “bombastic stunts masked as legal filings” that “do a disservice to the people of Oxford and the people of Michigan.”
“These latest false allegations are baseless, reckless and totally irresponsible,” Mullins said. “Mr. Fieger has named the wrong person in his sloppy legal filings and is refusing to retract his statements and dismiss him immediately, which is unconscionable. School employees continue to receive death threats, and Mr. Fieger is throwing gasoline on the fire with his shameless, callous and irresponsible tactics and angry rhetoric.”
Fieger, who has worked on several high-profile cases, including a similar lawsuit filed on behalf of the family of a student killed in the 1999 Columbine High School Massacre in Colorado, said school officials “allowed [a] deranged, homicidal student to return to class with a gun in his backpack, with over 30 rounds of ammo in his backpack, when they knew he was a homicidal threat,” adding “He was allowed to carry [the attack] out.”
According to the lawsuit, school officials were aware of threats of violence Crumbley allegedly made in multiple social media posts leading up to the deadly rampage and ignored a teacher’s report that Crumbley conducted an online ammunition search.
Plaintiffs further allege school employees failed to involve a campus safety officer in a meeting with Crumbley and his parents over the disturbing revelations, which also included a graphic, hand-drawn depiction of a gunman killing people purportedly found in Crumbley’s possession. The suit also says school officials falsely assured students and their parents “that there was no credible threat” in email and other correspondence, despite evidence to the contrary.
“The individually named Defendants are each responsible through their actions for making the student victims less safe,” reads a portion of the complaint. “The Oxford High School students, and Plaintiffs in particular, would have been safer had the Individual Defendants not taken the actions they did.”
Crumbley and his parents have entered “not guilty” pleas in their respective cases.
The slain students were identified as Madisyn Baldwin, 17; Tate Myre, 16; Hana St. Juliana, 14; and Justin Shilling, 17.