Editorial: When parents of mass shooters bear culpability, it’s right to charge them

Travis Reinking was a deeply troubled man. In 2016, he told police in downstate Morton that he believed singer Taylor Swift had been stalking him and had hacked into his cellphone. The following year, the Secret Service arrested him after he breached a security barrier outside the White House. He had been demanding to speak to then-President Donald Trump.

Reinking owned firearms, including an AR-15 assault-style rifle. After Reinking’s arrest outside the White House, authorities in Tazewell County seized his guns and his Illinois firearm owner’s identification card, at the request of the FBI. Illinois law allows guns that have been seized to be transferred to a family member who possesses a valid FOID card. Reinking’s father, Jeffrey, took custody of the firearms — then returned them, including the AR-15, to his mentally troubled son.

On April 22, 2018, Reinking, wearing nothing but a green jacket, wielded that AR-15 rifle as he walked into a Waffle House restaurant in Nashville, Tennessee. and opened fire, killing Taurean Sanderlin, 29; Joey Perez, 20; Akilah Dasilva, 23; and DeEbony Groves, 21. Four other people were injured.

Reinking was convicted of the murders and sentenced to life in prison without parole. At the sentencing, family members of his victims said that his bullets were still ripping apart their lives. But Travis Reinking’s father, Jeffrey Reinking, played a role. He knew all about his son’s erratic behavior, but gave the AR-15 and the other guns back to Travis.

The moment called for Jeffrey Reinking to make the right parenting decision, and to abide by the state’s gun laws. Instead he became an enabler.

That’s why, earlier this month, a Tazewell County judge sentenced Jeffrey Reinking to 18 months in prison for illegally delivering a firearm to a person who had been treated for mental illness within the past five years.

Gun control measures that take firearms out of the hands of unstable individuals and keep military-style firearms off the streets have been, and must continue to be, key components to America’s solution to gun violence and mass shootings. We have consistently backed those common sense measures, in part because they do not unduly encroach on law-abiding gun owners’ rights.

Just as important, however, is the obligation that Americans have to do the right thing when they know someone who has access to firearms, and is behaving erratically or shows signs of mental instability. If it’s a parent who is in that position of flagging the danger, that parent must act responsibly for the sake of their community, and for the sake of their child. And when they fail to do so, it’s entirely appropriate that they be held legally responsible.

There have been other recent mass shootings in which the parents of the alleged shooters have also been charged criminally for their roles.

Robert Crimo Jr., the father of alleged Highland Park mass shooter Robert Crimo III, has pleaded not guilty to felony reckless conduct charges after he allegedly helped his son obtain a license to purchase firearms even though he knew his son had previously threatened violence. Crimo’s son allegedly used an assault-style rifle to spray gunfire at people attending last summer’s Independence Day parade in Highland Park, killing seven people and injuring dozens of others.

Before Crimo III applied for a gun permit, police arrived at the family home in Highland Park in the fall of 2019 after getting a report that he had said he was “going to kill everybody.” Police confiscated the then 19-year-old’s knives and listed the teen as a “clear and present danger.”

Crimo III’s father later collected the weapons from police, which included 16 knives, a samurai sword and a dagger. The teen’s troubled history included an attempt to commit suicide with a machete. And yet, in December 2019, the teen’s father vouched for his underage son so that the teen could get a gun permit and buy guns, authorities say.

In Oakland County, Michigan, the parents of teenager Ethan Crumbley face a trial on charges of involuntary manslaughter for their alleged role in the actions of their son, who on Nov. 30, 2021, shot to death four schoolmates at his Oxford, Michigan, high school.

James and Jennifer Crumbley learned the day before the shooting that a teacher saw Ethan searching online for ammunition. On the morning of the shooting, the Crumbleys were summoned to the school, where school officials showed them a note that the then 15-year-old had drawn, with images of a gun, a person shot, a laughing emoji and the words “Blood everywhere” and “The thoughts won’t stop. Help me.”

School administrators asked Ethan’s parents to take the boy home that day, and they refused. That afternoon, Ethan took from his backpack the handgun his parents had bought him as a Christmas gift and unleashed terror on the school. He has pleaded guilty to the murders; his parents have pleaded not guilty to their charges.

Being a parent is tough. Being a parent in a family where guns are a way of life is doubly tough. Firearms must be safely stored. And if parents are aware of an adult son or daughter’s aberrant behavior, and that person has access to guns, those parents must recognize the risk and act. That’s what red flag laws are for.

Unfortunately, irresponsible, negligent behavior by some parents can help set the stage for tragedy. When that happens, police and prosecutors are right to step in and hold parents legally responsible, if the circumstances warrant criminal charges.

It wouldn’t have to come to that, however, if all parents understood what’s at stake when someone profoundly troubled has access to a gun.

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