They were charged with involuntary manslaughter. In Michigan, this occurs when a person is accidentally killed due to someone else's criminal negligence. This means that a person had no intention of killing another, but due to their careless or reckless actions, the person caused the death of another human being.
Here are some of the actions the parents committed according to the prosecutor:
1) On Black Friday, the father bought his 15 year old son a semiautomatic 9-millimeter Sig Sauer handgun.
2) His mother then went with her son to test the gun.
3) Social media posts were made by the mother about the purchase of the gun as a gift for their son. The 15 year old boy called it his "new beauty."
4) The gun was not locked up but kept in the parents' bedroom.
5) The day before the shooting, a teacher discovered the son searching online for ammunition. This was reported to school officials. They called the parents and left a voicemail and emailed the parents. The parents never responded.
6) However, the mother texted her son and said, "LOL I’m not mad at you. You have to learn not to get caught."
7) The next day, the day of the shooting, a teacher discovered a drawing by the son scrawled with images of a gun, a person who had been shot, a laughing emoji and the words “Blood everywhere” and “The thoughts won’t stop. Help me.”
8) The parents were called to the school for a meeting. In the meeting, they apparently never mentioned they had just bought their son a gun. They never inquired of their son as to where the gun was. The parents also did not search his backpack.
9) School officials told the parents they must get their son mental counseling within 48 hours. They also wanted the student to go home. The parents however resisted him being taken out of school. Son went back to class.
10) After the meeting, the father at some point went home and realized the gun was missing.
11) Once the school shooting news began to spread into the community, the mother texted her son and said, "Ethan don’t do it.”
12) The father only then called 911 to report the gun missing and that his son could be the shooter.