Families of the students who were killed in the 2021 Oxford High School shooting in Michigan addressed the convicted shooter for hours on Friday in a series of emotional victim impact statements ahead of his sentencing.
Ethan Crumbley, who was 15 at the time, shot and killed four fellow students: Madisyn Baldwin 17; Tate Myre, 16; Hana St. Juliana, 14; and Justin Shilling, 17. He also injured six other students and a teacher.
The shooter pleaded guilty last year to 24 charges, including premeditated murder and terrorism causing death. On Friday, Judge Kwamé Rowe sentenced him to life in prison without possibility of parole, the maximum sentence.
“The terror that he caused in the state of Michigan and in Oxford is a true act of terrorism,” Rowe said.
Ahead of his sentence, the families spoke before the court about their lasting pain and agony, asking the judge to take into account the lifelong impact of the shooter’s actions on them.
“I understand from journal entries that this was the desired outcome, for us to feel the pain that you had,” Buck Myre, Tate’s father said, referring to the shooter’s journal writings about his intentions. “I will tell you this: We are miserable. Our family has a permanent hole in it. It can never be fixed, ever.”
Many of the families who spoke asked for the judge to impose the maximum sentence.
“He purposely murdered my daughter, Hana, and three other children in order to make himself feel better,” Steve St. Juliana, Hana’s father, told the judge.
“I want to make my position regarding the defendant’s sentencing and his future very clear,” St. Juliana said. “There can be no forgiveness. There can be no rehabilitation. There is absolutely nothing that the defendant can ever do to earn my forgiveness.”
Students and teachers who survived the shooting also addressed the court. Keegan Gregory, a freshman at the time who was hiding in a bathroom with Justin Shilling when the shooter opened fire, spoke about the trauma that has followed him since.
“My brain is constantly operating from a place of fear and anxiety,” Gregory said.
Through tears, Madeline Johnson, a close friend of Madisyn Baldwin, talked in detail about the pain she carries to this day.
“I don’t enjoy things, but all these combined are not even nearly as painful as it is to live without my best friend,” Johnson said, before directly addressing the shooter: “I want the person who did this to know that Madisyn would have been your friend,” she said. “I want you to know that she would have treated you with nothing but kindness had you not killed her.”
Crumbley, hunched over in his seat and flanked by his lawyers, hung his head low and looked down at his lap.
