Yep. I’m pretty sure “Don’t buy your disturbed kid a gun” is a reasonable minimum requirement for a parent.
It’s bad enough they didn’t do anything to actually help the kid, but buying the gun was an active step towards making things worse. A step that they had no reason to take. No teenager needs a handgun. Even if you’re a hard-core 2nd amendment fanatic, you can just rent guns to teach your kid how to use them.
Me too.
Or you can buy one that is the kid’s to use, but not freaking allow him to carry it around. I had a friend whose dad was a police detective, and wanted to teach his kid gun safety, since he lived with a gun (albeit, one locked up every night).
He bought his son a gun for his bar mitzvah, took him to a range and taught him to shoot, took him home, and taught him how to clean it, store in in a locked box in two pieces, but with a trigger-guard nonetheless, and hand his father the key, then put the box at the top of his closet, where it lived unless he went with his father to practice at a range.
A 18 or 19 yo working as security might, but yes, no minor should own a handgun, or any sore of significant gun.
My dad did buy me a single shot target .22 rifle when I passed the gun safety course.
Well, yes, but the gun was always in the parents control.
Yeah, @RivkahChaya 's point was that it is possible to buy a minor a gun in a responsible way. That’s not what these parents did.
So far as I can tell, the only debatable point is whether what the parents did was negligent. Because if they had wanted a school shooting, I can’t think of anything they would have done differently.
When I knew him, he was 13 - 14 - 15, at some point, he was going to get more control, but there were laws were minors couldn’t have guns outside of home or a range, or something-- I don’t totally remember-- but I think he was going to get the key when he got his driver’s license, so he could go target shooting by himself, but he had to drive with the gun disassembled.
'Course, he had to prove himself responsible in the interim. If he goofed around at the range, or did something untoward at home, he could blow getting the key at 16.
I mean, yeah. Is there some debate about that? Mom n Dad’s car, they are responsible for the damage it causes–whether driven by them, by someone they allowed to drive it, or by a household member who is able to access the improperly-secured keys. As it pertains to the subject at hand, same would apply if he gained unauthorized access to Mom n Dad’s firearms. And more to the point, him snaking the family car is different from Mom n Dad handing him the keys before he’d had any formal training.
As a gun owner, I am 1,000% behind the decision to hold this knucklehead CHILD’s parents accountable for what they equipped him to do. It sucks to have to answer for mischief someone else gets up to, but when they get up to it because you enabled them (and I am willing to admit I believe the sort of person who gives a firearm to a child–especially an adolescent boy–is the same sort who look for every opportunity to claim the right to discharge it into another human being), it’s all on you. Would it be different if they’d handed him a Bowie knife instead? Yes. Guns make killin’ easy, and all the supercool badguys and kids who make the news use them. Knives are too personal, difficult to wield effectively, you get tired after stabbing more than three or four people, and last but not least, you run the risk of getting punched in the face if you try and stab someone. Not such a risk from 20 feet.
Not really. To be clear, I think people should be civilly and criminally responsible for any harm done by their guns. If you have a gun it should be kept locked and disabled, or on your person unless someone with a bigger gun takes it away from. But there is no such law and I’m concerned with the use of current laws in this manner in cases less clear than this. I think it’s worthwhile examining the details of the law and how they have been, and will be applied in the future.
To be honest, if everything in this story was the same except if was images of “knife violence” and he stabbed another kid with the big nasty looking Bowie knife they bought him . . still guilty.
The YouTuber LegalEagle has posted a video summarizing what happened at Crumbley’s trial and what is likely to happen next. If you are interested in this case I think it is worth a watch. (25 minutes)
Update:
James Crumbley, the father of the teenager who killed four students at a Michigan high school in 2021, was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in a trial that comes a month after the shooter’s mother was convicted of the same charges.
Crumbley was convicted of four counts of involuntary manslaughter, a charge that carries a maximum punishment of up to 15 years in prison, which would run concurrently.
I can’t say that I’m surprised by this outcome. It’s just unreal to think that these parents could have saved the lives of others, if only they had actually done something to help their son with his emotional struggles. But hey, why bother getting the kid help? Just buy him a gun.
That’s the part that clinched it for me.
On what planet did his parents think giving him a gun was a good idea? “Hey, our kid is weird (paraphrasing but on the record)…let’s buy him a gun! That’ll make things better!” 
His parents were uninvolved. Buying him a gun was deeply irresponsible and we can see that without hindsight.
Hey, when the kid begged his dad for help, the dad told him to “suck it up!” I mean, what more should the dad have done??
I mean, if they’d just been uninvolved, maybe they wouldn’t be liable. The problem is that they knew he had violent gun fantasies and that the school was worried about him AND they illegally bought him a gun.
And, if I remember correctly, the school asked to search the boy’s backpack (where the gun was), and the parents refused permission.
Actually, I don’t believe the school tried to search the backpack.
Dean of students handed backpack back to student on morning of shooting
Nobody searched the backpack because there was no reason to suspect any wrongdoing.
IMO the school was too lax and should have insisted the parents take their son to the emergency room immediately, based on the drawings he made that morning. However, the parents were the only ones who knew that their son had access to an unsecured gun in the home, which they had given him, and they didn’t say anything to the school administration or check the backpack themselves. The meeting with the parents only lasted a few minutes, and then the mom said, “Are we done here?”
Also, reportedly the shooter’s dad made threats over the recorded jail phone and tablet, presumably to potential witnesses, although not much is known about it at this time.
Each parent sentenced (CNN) to 10-15 years with credit for 2 years served. I think this is appropriate.
Agree. I hope this will push the needle on their narrative that they didn’t do anything wrong toward “No! You do NOT give your troubled kid a gun. Ever!”
Sounds about right. Maybe they can give the 3 of them a “family suite”!