Oxford school shooter Ethan Crumbley spent nine minutes hunting for victims and emptying a gun into a high school hallway and bathroom, according to a timeline obtained by The Detroit News.
After Oakland County Sheriff’s deputies arrived on the scene, he continued walking through the school, firing his gun before officers spotted Crumbley in the building — just outside the bathroom — and took him into custody. and injured and killed the victims.
The timeline, which has not been officially released before, was made available this week through a media request by The Detroit News. It shows the Nov. 30, 2021, attack at Oxford High School lasted several minutes longer than authorities initially described after the incident. Four students – Hana St. Juliana, 14; Madisyn Baldwin, 17; Tate Mair, 16; and Justin Schilling, 17, were killed and seven others, including a teacher, were injured at the Michigan school that day.
Several families of the victims and survivors have publicly asked the school district, police, prosecutors and school board for a full accounting and timeline of the attack that occurred more than 15 months ago.
The release of the Oxford history timeline comes days after the February 13 mass shooting at Michigan State University, less than four weeks after the incident that left three students dead and several others injured. The accused, a 43-year-old Lansing man, shot himself and died within hours of the attack.
In Oxford, information from police and prosecutors about the attack and the suspect has been limited because of pending investigations and criminal charges against Crumbley and her parents, Jennifer and James Crumbley.
In initial reports days after the shooting, Sheriff’s officials said “the whole thing” took five minutes, and deputies approached Crumble within minutes after making hundreds of 911 calls to police. A timeline obtained by The News shows deputies attended the suspect eight minutes after the 911 calls came in.
Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard said details of the shooting were released hours after it happened, and in several cases investigators had to update earlier statements about preliminary evidence in the case, from the number of live rounds fired from the suspect to details of how long. was opened.
Bouchard told The News that the timeline is not new and was discussed verbally — by Bouchard himself — in the case, during several media press conferences in the days and weeks after the attack.
“The timeline is available and has been from the beginning,” Bouchard said.
A timeline was created by investigators using a combination of data and information from school surveillance video, radio communications and squad car videos, Bouchard said. Bouchard said the paper was documented during the investigation. Asked when, Bouchard said at the beginning of the investigation.
“To come up with a timeline, we had to compare time stamps on radio traffic, car cameras, look at school video,” Bouchard said. “A lot of it took time. It came out early. I don’t know how people missed it. It was word of mouth. We didn’t print it and distribute it.”
Parent Megan Gregory, whose son Keegan was confronted by Schilling by Crumbley in the boys’ bathroom, says she has questioned some details in police accounts of the timeline of the attack for more than 15 months and feels the public has a different understanding. No official schedule has been made public about what happened at the school that day. Keegan survived the shooting.
Gregory says he’s never seen a sheriff’s department timetable, so he made his own.
“People always ask why we don’t have it. If it was published and published, it would be unanswered. None of us have it,” Grigoriy said.
Steve St. Juliana, whose daughter Hana was killed in the attack, confirmed he had never seen the timeline and asked for it.
Gregory said of the attack that “bits and pieces” of information had been released. “There’s never been a real ‘This happened at this time’ document. We’ve created our own timelines. The more knowledge we get, the better for all of us. We’ve been asking for a while: what is the timeline? ?”
St. Juliana said members of the sheriff’s department sat down with him personally to explain what happened during the shooting. But he still has many questions about the police response and exactly when it happened at Oxford High School.
“We still haven’t heard the full story of what happened. People expected it to be revealed during the trial. With the shooter’s confession, it never happened,” St. Juliana said.
Something that shows the timeline
According to the timeline, at 12:51 a.m. on Nov. 30, 2021, the shooting began when Crumbley exited the school’s bathroom at the south end of the 200 block, turned left, and shot his first victims. He then shot the other victims on the left side of the corridor and continued east down the 200 corridor. As he drove east, he shot another victim.
The timeline shows one victim tripping (probably after a gunshot wound), knocking over a trash can, and escaping through door seven. Crumble continued on and turned the corner to head north down the 200 concourse, where, in the camera’s view, he fired at the victims as they ran north.
An unknown woman was running down the hall when Crumbley leveled a gun and fired at her. He then shot into classrooms near rooms 245 and 247 as he moved north, then into classrooms near rooms 240 and 238.
At 12:52 p.m., the first 911 calls come into dispatch centers. Dispatch broadcast has started.
At 12:52 p.m., Crumbley fired two rounds into the high school’s “cube” area, heading north through hall 200 and into a nearby classroom 224, striking the victim.
At 12:53 p.m., Crumbley fired into a classroom on or near 220, exchanged ammunition magazines, and continued north down the 200 corridor. He turned around, shot into a classroom near 215, and headed south.
At 12:54 p.m., the killer entered the boys’ bathroom, just off the 400 block, the schedule said. According to reports from the families of the victims, this is where Crumbley met students Schilling and Gregory. Crumbley killed Schilling and ordered Gregory to put him against the wall inside the bathroom.
At 12:56, the first two deputies arrived at the scene at the same time, and at 12:57 they entered the building and started searching.
At 1:00 p.m., Crumble came out of the boys’ bathroom, where deputies spotted him and took him into custody.
Four minutes later, at 1:04 p.m., Crumbley was escorted out of the school building by police. At 1:20 p.m., the last wounded victim was taken out of the high school.
Oxford parents still want more details
St. Juliana said information about the mass shooting was limited from the start, which was understandable because prosecutors were working their case in court. But with the delay in a third-party investigation into the attack pushing the publication date of Guidepost Solutions’ report to late next month, answers are still needed, he said.
“It’s just a matter of wanting to understand the full picture. There have been questions about the timeline and what Bouchard is commenting on. Some of them are inconsistent. I haven’t seen anyone address that,” St. Juliana said. .
Any parent or community member who would like to see the first schedule can do so by contacting their office, Bouchard said. It’s an offer he says he’s made before.
Bouchard said the second table was created with information up to the second and is part of the evidence in both criminal cases. It is not released.
Gregory said one thing that worries him is what’s missing from the timeline, including the moment he said was captured on school video when a school security guard, a retired sheriff’s deputy, entered the boys’ bathroom. walked and opened the house. in and out.
Gregory, who watched the video of the attack, said based on the time stamp on the video, which reads 12:58 p.m., he, like Justin’s mother, believes Justin was still alive inside the bathroom when the security officer opened the door. .
Asked why this moment is not part of the timeline, Bouchard said, “It’s not our staff. We haven’t done any of the school staff. This schedule is our response.”
Oxford parent Andrea Jones said she had not seen the timeline before The News provided her with a copy to read.
“It’s the first time I’ve ever seen it. It’s really — it’s nerve-wracking to read and it’s hard to watch as a parent,” Jones said. “It puts you in that space. You relive it.”
Jones said it’s important for the public to have information.
“For one, it establishes the sequence of events of where the failures occurred. It’s not just about response time. It’s about when and who was where and where they should have been,” Jones said. .
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