Watch replay: Prosecution testimony continues in Jennifer Crumbley trial

We're back in the courtroom of Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Cheryl Matthews on Wednesday as Jennifer Crumbley's unprecedented trial on involuntary manslaughter charges continues.

She is the first parent in America to stand trial on charges stemming from a child's mass school shooting. Her son Ethan Crumbley has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for murdering four people at Oxford High School in November 2021. Father James Crumbley faces the same charges and is scheduled for trial March 5.

Watch replay of the livestream here.

School officials were on the hot seat Tuesday, explaining why the shooter wasn't sent home after his parents were called to Oxford High on the morning of the shooting over a disturbing drawing, and why they didn't search his backpack, which held the gun his father bought him days before and that he would use hours later to kill four and wound seven.

Jennifer Crumbley's ex-lover testifies about texts

In a surprising turn of events, Jennifer Crumbley agreed to let jurors hear about an affair she had.

Her decision was announced while Brian Meloche was on the stand.

His testimony appears below regarding messages he exchanged on Facebook Instant Messenger with Jennifer Crumbley after the shooting.

What the jury did not know initially is that Meloche had an affair with Crumbley. Judge Matthews previously ruled that Jennifer Crumbley's extramarital affair would not be admitted at trial, concluding it was irrelevant to the charges and prejudicial.

But Jennifer Crumbley's lawyer Shannon Smith wanted to question Meloche about his dealings with police, and whether they threatened him that he may lose his job as a firefighter and put his pension at risk if he tried to help Jennifer Crumbley after the shooting.

Smith argues that Meloche has changed his story, to the detriment of her client, because he was intimidated by police.

Assistant Prosecutor Marc Keast argued that if that happens, then prosecutors have the right to disclose to the jury that Meloche had an affair with Jennifer Crumbley.

Smith said bring it — "open that door."

"She had an affair. Lots of people have affairs. It doesn't mean you know your son is going to be a school shooter," Smith said.

"I want to make sure you understand what your lawyer said," Matthews said to Crumbley. "I want to make sure that you are supportive of that."

"I trust her, yes," Crumbley responded.

Minutes later, her ex-lover returned to the stand, with the jury learning they had an affair.

How far Keast goes with the affair remains to be seen, though he argued to the judge that there is more evidence of other affairs by Jennifer Crumbley, that she went on trips with a boyfriend and ignored her son — all of which he claims is relevant to this case, but the judge has previously ruled cannot be admitted at trial.

"She isn't charged with being immoral," Matthews said.

Keast conceded that's true, but stressed she is accused of neglecting her duty as a parent.

Mom tells friend to clear his cache after messaging

Meloche testified that he met Jennifer Crumbley in high school and her husband, James, when they moved back to Michigan, but said he never met their son.

He said he followed Jennifer Crumbley on Facebook and communicated with her regularly in person, texts and through a messaging app. He testified he deleted messages they had exchanged.

Meloche testified that he received a message from her on Nov. 30, 2021, that she had to go to a meeting at the school involving her son. He said before going to the school, she told him in a message she “was worried he was going to do something dumb.”

Meloche, who said he was aware the Crumbleys had purchased the gun because of a Facebook post, testified he asked her where the firearm was and she responded it was in her vehicle. He testified he told her that was not a good place and it shouldn’t be there.

Meloche testified that he continued communicating with Jennifer Crumbley that day after the school shooting.

Assistant Prosecutor Keast said a search warrant was executed from Facebook and some messages were obtained. The prosecution admitted those.

In one that Jennifer Crumbley sent to Meloche just after midnight on Dec. 1, 2021, she wrote: “I failed as a parent. I failed miserably”

Meloche responded: “You didn’t do this.”

She later shared a message expressing that she was upset she couldn’t see her horses, and at one point wrote that news articles were saying both parents would be charged.

“I heard that but I can’t imagine what they could possibly charge you with,” he responded, and urged her to not believe news reports.

Jennifer Crumbley told him, “It’s coming from the prosecuting attorney” and that she needed to retain a lawyer. She also told Meloche that: “Everything was secured, not loaded, bullets stored away separately omg omg omg.”

In another message, she wrote: “I’ll never be OK. I lost my son And he’s a murderer and I’ll forever have to live with the guilt of that I’m not even sure life is worth living anymore”

She also wrote that they will never be the same.

“Never ever,” Meloche wrote.

“It’s like mourning the death of my child.”

On Dec. 2, she also told Meloche in a message that they were “on the run again. Helicopters not sure where to I’ll message you.”

Another message shows Jennifer Crumbley told Meloche “Clear your cache” and he responded: “Good move.”

Under questioning by the defense, Meloche testified that when questioned by law enforcement the first time, he told them he and Jennifer Crumbley had an affair. He testified that he again told law enforcement about the affair in a second interview in February 2022 and in a third interview, as well.

Meloche, who is a firefighter, said under questioning from Smith that during the third interview, law enforcement talked to him about his employment and details about his benefits, including his pension.

“When you were in that third interview, you were scared at the thought of losing your job or benefits,” Smith asked.

“No, I was not,” Meloche testified.

Meloche testified that law enforcement asked him many of the same questions he had been asked before, told him they had evidence of Jennifer Crumbley lying about things, and talked to him about ranks within the fire department, seniority and how he got to each position at the fire department. He said the officer reassured him he was not in any trouble.

“That officer tells you he’s not trying to be threatening to you, but he wants to put the cards on the table, correct?” Smith asked. “Do you recall that?”

“Yes,” he said.

Smith again asked if he took that to mean his job or benefits could be on the line if he said anything favorable for Jennifer Crumbley. The prosecution objected, saying Meloche had just said he was not threatened.

Judge Matthews asked Meloche if there was a specific threat to him and he said no.

“Did you take anything as a veiled threat?” Matthews asked.

Meloche said, “Yes, just that the information that’s now out regarding my relationship was going to be out publicly."

More messages between Jennifer Crumbley and ex-lover

While Meloche was on the stand, jurors saw multiple messages between him and Jennifer Crumbley in the hours and days after the shooting, including texts in which Jennifer Crumbley blasted school officials.

She took issue with how a counselor and dean of students handled the meeting when she and her husband were called to the school over their son's violent drawing.

"They didn’t see him as a threat and (decided) he could stay in school, which is what he wanted to do. His f------ backpack was with him why didn’t they search it?!?” Jennifer Crumbley messaged Meloche on Dec. 3, three days after the shooting.

She also wrote, “No officer was Notified and apparently there were threats and no one, not even us notified.”

“I don’t understand how the school was so nonchalant about this and prior threats,” he wrote back.

“I don’t know. But it failed my son and 4 other families,” Jennifer Crumbley wrote.

“And also you two,” Meloche messaged.

She wrote, “yes,” but Ethan is alive “and he was responsible for the LOSS OF LIVES.”

Here are other Facebook message exchanges that the defense showed jurors between Crumbley and her ex-boyfriend.

Jennifer Crumbley: “I’m scared.”

Meloche: “I bet. You literally need to disappear once you are free to do so.”

Why did you say that? Smith asked Meloche.

He said the public pressure and threats on social media were too much, and he wanted Jennifer Crumbley to stay safe.

More messages followed from Crumbley.

“My son did this. I still can’t figure out where his brain snapped,” she messaged Meloche on Dec. 1, the day after the shooting. “I want to die.”

As the messages were shown, Meloche testified: "I wasn’t ever thinking a shooting would take place. I thought he would hurt himself.”

Meloche also warned her in a text message: "Be careful what you type … the FBI is involved. They can access anything and everything.”

Later, she messaged him that her son was being charged as an adult, that she was "sick" and that she was trying to find a place to stay. He wrote her that he was glad she was safe.

“Jen, I can't even imagine being in your shoes," Meloche texted

Then came messages about her potential liability.

"I heard we may be charged."

Meloche responded: "I heard that too. I think they will only charge James with the handgun not being secured."

What police found when the Crumbleys were arrested

William Creer, a forensic technician with the Detroit Police Department, testified about documenting the scene and collecting evidence at the building on Detroit's eastside where James and Jennifer Crumbley were arrested.

Prosecutors showed photos of the couple’s vehicle in the parking area, as well as photos from inside of the art studio in the building where the couple was found. Images showed a mattress on the floor, clothes, plastic cups, a roll of paper towers and food items, including bananas, orange juice, a box of cereal and a 2-liter bottle of Vernors. Creer testified they also documented a backpack that contained items, including women’s underwear, caffeine pills and an ointment for horses.

Other photos included an empty bottle of whiskey in a garbage can, receipts and images of a purse, which contained cash, envelops of cash, bottles of prescribed medication, keys and four cell phones, including one that Creer described as being severely damaged.

The prosecution brought out the backpack and items of clothing that were recovered.

When the Crumbleys were arrested

After hearing from the 9-1-1 caller who informed authorities of James and Jennifer Crumbley's location days after the shooting, jurors saw dramatic video footage from the night the parents were arrested while sleeping in a Detroit art gallery.

With guns drawn, a team of SWAT team officers entered the room and hollered instructions.

“On your f---ing stomach” an officer is heard yelling.

James Crumbley can be heard moaning and screaming.

“What’s your name?” an officer asks.

“James. James Crumbley,” he answered.

Once in handcuffs, James Crumbley is seen staring at the floor while a team of about a half dozen officers roam about the room.

The video was shown during the testimony of Cpl. David Shaw with the Detroit Police Department special response team, who was the first member of his team on the scene the night the Crumbleys were arrested.

He described for jurors the scene that night, saying there were “a ton of officers” already there, about 20 in the main entryway alone.

“We made entry into this building … we started searching the main floor slowly,” he said.

They broke one door down with a 35-pound ram, he said, noting the officer found nothing.

They then went to the second floor, cleared it, then went to the third floor, cleared that.

They wound up back on the first floor, where an officer opened the door to Suite 130 and found the Crumbleys sleeping, facing one another.

'The parents of the shooter that are running away, they’re here'

Luke Kirtley, whose business Coffeehaus is in the building on Detroit’s east side where James and Jennifer Crumbley were apprehended in December 2021, testified that he was aware of the school shooting and a poster with a description of the couple’s vehicle and its license plate number.

He said that when he went to the building on the night of Dec. 3, 2021, he saw a car in the parking lot that resembled the car on the wanted posters. Kirtley testified he pulled up the poster on his phone, walked around the car and realized the license plate was the same as on the poster.

“I looked over and saw somebody sitting next to the car on the curb” near the rear passenger side, he said.

He testified that he turned his flashlight off and went back into the building, assuming the person sitting near the car was related to the incident. Kirtley testified he went into his office and called 9-1-1.

The prosecution showed surveillance footage that overlooks the building’s parking area. The video sows him walking over to check the license plate. As they watched the video, Karen McDonald asked Kirtley what he was doing at one point in the surveillance footage.

Kirtley said: “Playing it cool.”

Prosecutors played his 9-1-1 call and Kirtley can be heard saying: “The parents of the shooter that are running away, they’re here. ”

He explained that it was the parents of “the Oakland shooter, the kid, has the two parents that are on the run right now.”

He testified he made the call from a corner of his office, and maybe 5 minutes later, he saw police lights. Kirtley said he met police, pointed out the car and let them into the building. He said a few minutes later, more officers showed up.

He testified they “came like locked and loaded.”

During cross-examination, Smith asked Kirtley if the person he saw sitting outside that night tried to run away. No, he answered, adding he did not know if the person saw him.

Searching for the Crumbleys

Lt. Sgt. David Hendrick, who oversaw a fugitive apprehension task force assigned to help locate the Crumbleys in the days after the shooting, described the manhunt.

Hendrick told his crew to first check the addresses of friends of the Crumbleys. He eventually learned the couple had gone to a hotel, but did not know which one.

On the afternoon of Dec. 3, three days after the shooting, the couple’s vehicle was spotted at an Auburn Hills hotel, but the couple had left the vehicle there and traveled to another unknown location.

The task force would then learn that another vehicle owned by the Crumbleys was spotted outside an industrial building on Detroit’s east side.

Surveillance was set up.

Dozens of police vehicles converged on the scene.

The couple was found at 1 a.m. Dec. 4. in an art studio inside the building.

On cross-examination, Smith asked Hendrick if he knew that Jennifer Crumbley had hired a lawyer before she was arrested by police and that her lawyer had filed an appearance in court documents.

No, Hendrick replied.

Jennifer Crumbley: 'He's going to have to pay'

The prosecution has said it expects to rest its case by Friday and it still had nine witnesses to put on the stand.

Det. Lt. Sam Marzban Sam Marten of the Oakland County Sheriff’s Department was the first witness Wednesday. His job included identifying the shooting victims. He provided graphic details for the jury about what he encountered that day, including how one of the victims was still wearing her backpack when he found her in the hallway. She had been shot in the head.

“It was kind of surreal,” he said of the scene.

Marzban also helped secure a search warrant of the shooter’s house, after identifying him through items found in his backpack, including his cellphone. On it were texts from his mom: “Ethan don’t do it,” she texted about an hour after the shooting had been reported.

“Ethan, call me now,” read a text from his dad.

But by then, Ethan Crumbley already had killed four classmates and wounded seven other people at the school.

Marzban also testified about the demeanor of Jennifer  Crumbley when he first encountered her at the family home hours after the shooting. He told jurors that he sought to seize the parents' cellphones because he believed they were relevant to the shooting, particularly the mom’s text: "Ethan don’t do it."

“She did not want to give me her phone. She seemed irritated,” Marzban testified, adding he explained that this was part of the investigation. He said her husband told her the police would eventually get the phone, so she turned it over and gave him the password.

"I could tell she was kind of frustrated," Marzban told jurors. "I told her there several dead kids ... and that this was a significant incident, that it was on the national news and that the president had addressed it."

"Was Jennifer Crumbley crying?" Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald asked the witness.

She was not, he answered, but recalled Jennifer Crumbley saying, "'Lives were lost today, and he's going to have to suffer.'

"The choice of words was odd for me," he said.

On cross-examination, Smith asked Marzban if one of the concerns Jennifer Crumbley had about not having her cellphone was not having access to numbers for people on her contact list. Marzban said that’s why he allowed her to take down numbers.

Under questioning by Smith, Marzban said he only took one phone from Jennifer Crumbley.

“When you were taking that cellphone, if that was her only phone, it would be fair to say she wouldn’t have a phone to use after that,” Smith asked.

“Yes, that’s why I suggested she go purchase another phone,” he said, adding he suggested she buy a prepaid phone and provide that number to law enforcement.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Watch replay: Prosecution testimony continues in Jennifer Crumbley trial