Prosecutor had family ties to producer of Hulu documentary on the Crumbleys: ‘It’s icky’
For two years, the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office withheld from the defense and the public multiple secrets and controversial deals it made during its historic prosecution of the Oxford High School shooter’s parents: Confidential agreements with key school witnesses. Contracts with high-priced public relations firms. A nondisclosure agreement with a reporter who got inside access to the prosecution’s trial strategy.
Now comes this: The executive producer of a Hulu documentary about the parents that was filmed while a judge’s gag order was in place had family ties to Chief Assistant Prosecutor David Williams — she is his wife’s cousin, by marriage, a woman he is friendly with and attends family gatherings with.
The Free Press exclusively learned about the connection after obtaining multiple documents that linked the two, showing Williams gave the producer/family member seemingly preferential treatment, confidential materials, as well as access to the inner workings of his office as it built its novel case against James and Jennifer Crumbley, the first parents in America to be held responsible in a mass school shooting committed by their son.
Joshua Marquis, a former Oregon prosecutor of nearly 40 years and former vice president of the National District Attorneys Association, said he has multiple concerns with the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office giving media access to trial strategy sessions, and giving what appears to be preferential treatment to a family member’s relative.
Chief Assistant Prosecutor David Williams looks over notes of a homicide case from 2021 at the Oakland County Circuit Court in Pontiac on Thursday, Sept. 30, 2021.
One, he said, there was a gag order in place. Secondly, a prosecutor’s first duty is to the community, the victims and its witnesses, who may not have had a say in ABC’s behind-the-scenes access. Third, he said, public officials need to be mindful of doing any work with those they have personal ties to.
When he was told of Williams’ ties to the producer, he said: “That’s icky … it makes me uncomfortable, and I probably wouldn’t do it. … As a public official, if you ever give an advantage to someone related to you, either by family or a business relationship … that could be misconduct.”
The documentary, “Sins of the Parents: The Crumbley Trials,” aired nine days after the Crumbleys were sentenced to 10-15 years in prison, respectively, over their roles in the November 2021 deadly school shooting carried out by their son. The film came as a surprise to many — including the judge who oversaw the trials — as it contained footage from trial strategy sessions, witness preparations and interviews with prosecutors in their homes and offices.
The Oxford community also was stunned and traumatized by the documentary’s release, according to an April 14, 2024, email that Williams sent an ABC producer and copied his wife’s cousin on: “All of us who have seen the trailer are impressed … Unfortunately, the timing of the trailer and release has generated trauma in the community and lots of feedback and questions for our office.”
The email continues: “During the filming, we were under the impression that the doc would drop months after the verdict(s) and sentence(s), not days. We were stunned to have the trailer drop on GMA (“Good Morning America”) and in Times Square less than 72 hours after the sentencing.”
This new information comes to light as the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office is scheduled to head to court on Friday for a proceeding to help determine whether Jennifer Crumbley will have her conviction tossed and/or be granted a new trial. Prosecutors are there to defend what is perhaps its most controversial confidential agreement: a deal that protected two important school staff witnesses from having statements they made to investigators from being used against them, but was never disclosed to the defense.
It is unclear whether the new revelation about the family ties will have any impact on the prosecution’s case. Late Thursday afternoon, the judge issued an opinion dismissing numerous claims by the defense, including allegations that the prosecution engaged in a “smear campaign” against the Crumbleys. But she did not rule against hearing both sides out about the deals with school officials.
Prosecutor\’s office: We did not ask ABC \’to hide\’ family connection\’
In a statement issued late Thursday to the Free Press, the prosecutor’s office acknowledged that David Williams and the documentary’s executive producer, Cheryl Horner McDonough, are connected by marriage: his wife’s mother is the sister of McDonough’s stepfather.
“David knows McDonough socially and they are friendly. They have been together at family functions over the years. This information has been publicly known for some time,” Jeff Wattrick, pubic information officer for the prosecutor’s office, said in the statement. “We assume ABC News’ decision to not publicly disclose connections between David Williams and Cheryl Horner McDonough was based upon their ethical and journalistic standards. Our office did not ask them to hide or obscure this or any other fact.”
A senior producer at ABC who pitched the documentary to David Williams in a letter said she did not know about this relationship.
Meanwhile, the prosecutor’s office says the decision to allow McDonough and the ABC crew to follow prosecutors “was based upon McDonough’s extensive credits, including the award-winning ‘Parkland Rising’ documentary about the student survivors of the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida.
“That unique background, rather than any personal relationship, provided the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office with confidence that the documentary would be responsible in its storytelling and empathic to the Oxford victims,” the statement reads. “Our office had no creative or editorial input into the production and no one in our office saw the documentary in any form until the day it was released.”
McDonough declined comment. So did Williams.
Secret deals with witnesses play crucial role in fate of convictions
On Friday, the agreements the prosecution cut with the two key school witnesses will play front and center in a crucial hearing before Judge Cheryl Matthews, who will hear arguments about whether to grant a new trial to Jennifer Crumbley, vacate her conviction, or let the guilty verdicts stand.
Crumbley’s defense alleges, among other things, that the prosecution unlawfully withheld from her the partial immunity agreements that protected those two key school witnesses from having anything they told investigators from being used against them. Those deals, known as proffer agreements, were discovered and disclosed by the Free Press last March following the conviction of James Crumbley, the shooter’s father. James and Jennifer Crumbley were tried, convicted and sentenced in separate trials.
The prosecutor’s office maintains no immunity was granted, so they didn’t have to be disclosed.
However, Jennifer Crumbley’s appellate lawyer, Michael Dezsi, disagrees, maintaining the proffer agreements amount to evidence that was favorable to Jennifer Crumbley, but were unlawfully and intentionally withheld from her. And that, Dezsi contends, constitutes prosecutorial misconduct
The prosecution argues the guilty verdicts should stick, maintaining Crumbley was convicted fair and square for failing to take acts that could have saved four lives, and that it has handled the case properly and lawfully.
Dezsi disagrees on multiple fronts, alleging the prosecution unlawfully withheld evidence from the defense, inconsistently charged the shooter as an adult while accusing the mom of failing to control her minor child, hired pricey law firms to run a “smear campaign” against the Crumbleys, violated a gag order and handpicked news media outlets to tell a “skewed story, manufactured to rally support in placing the blame for school shootings on parents.”
The prosecutor’s office says it did not seek out the Hulu documentary, or any media attention for that matter, and that ABC came to them about the documentary.
Prosecutor never disclosed family ties
According to internal documents obtained by the Free Press, the Hulu documentary was produced through an agreement that ABC News Studios negotiated through Williams in early June 2022 — three weeks before the judge issued a gag order prohibiting both sides from publicly discussing the case with anyone.
Williams, who was featured in the film, has long defended the deal his office made with ABC. He maintains that because the documentary aired after the trials ended, the gag order was not violated.
But Williams has never publicly disclosed that he had family ties to the producer, whose name was included in letters and emails involving the arrangement between ABC and the prosecutor’s office, which discussed the idea of the documentary with Williams before writing him this letter.
“Dear David, as discussed, ABC News is very interested in following the team at the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office as they prepare their case against James and Jennifer Crumbley,” a producer — not McDonough — writes in a letter dated June 2, 2022, almost four weeks before the judge issued a gag order.
The letter explained how the network wanted to give viewers a behind-the-scenes look at the prosecution, stating “the production team will be led by Two-Time Emmy Award Winner Cheryl McDonough” (the relative) and “will work closely with David Williams.”
On June 27, 2022, the judge issued a gag order in the case, prohibiting both sides from discussing the case with any media, or making any public statements about it.
Nonetheless, the prosecutor’s office went ahead with its plans. Behind closed doors, while proclaiming in open court that it couldn’t answer media questions due to the gag order, Oakland County prosecutors had an ABC film crew and Washington Post reporter embedded in its office.
Hulu documentary trashes Crumbleys \’Those people are – Yikes\’
The Crumbleys made history last year after separate juries convicted them of involuntary manslaughter for the deaths of four students murdered by their son: Tate Myre, 16; Hana St. Juliana, 14; Madisyn Baldwin, 17, and Justin Shilling, 17. Six other students were injured in the massacre, as was one teacher. The juries concluded the parents failed to take steps that could have prevented the shooting, like notifying the school that their son had access to a gun they had purchased for him just days before the rampage.
The shooter, who was 15 at the time, pleaded guilty to everything and is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole. He is appealing. So are his parents, who maintain they never knew their son was planning to shoot up his school, and that the gun at issue was hidden in an armoire, unloaded, with the bullets stored in a separate drawer.
Prosecutors also hammered away at this theme at trial: that the Crumbleys allegedly knew their son was mentally spiraling, but failed to get him help and got him a gun instead. The Crumbleys maintain that they never knew their son was mentally ill, other than him being anxious about school and his future, and that the gun at issue was not his to use freely.
The narrative that played out in the Hulu documentary focused largely on the prosecution’s claims that the Crumbleys were neglectful and self-serving parents who had affairs, drank excessively and paid more attention to their horses than their son.
As Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said in the documentary: “Those parents are — yikes. The life they lived was just crazy. The sexting and the really terrible things they videoed of their sexual acts …”
The documentary also showed images of the Crumbleys’ unkept home and booze bottles, where prosecutors were taped hugging a child in a tidy kitchen, or making a salad for their spouse.
In announcing the documentary, here’s what ABC News Studios had to say:
“ABC News Studios was granted rare exclusive access inside the prosecutor’s office over the course of two years as McDonald and her team of attorneys crafted their case. The cameras were rolling for key moments during major hearings and private conversations, even going home with McDonald, capturing contemplative moments as she processed the weight of the case.”
ABC, however, was not the only national news outlet to get inside access to the novel prosecution.
A Washington Post reporter also signed a nondisclosure contract on Aug. 2, 2022, that gave him access, leading to a published, in-depth story about what went on behind the scenes as the prosecution built and tried the case.
Then there’s the public relations issue.
Defense: prosecution paid $100K-plus on PR \’smear campaign\’ against Crumbleys
Dezsi also has argued in court documents that the prosecutor’s office quietly and discreetly hired two high-priced public relations firms to run a “smear campaign” against the Crumbleys, who were publicly portrayed by the prosecution as philandering drunks who allegedly loved their horses more than their son, and ignored his mental health needs.
Dezsi argues the prosecutor’s office paid two PR firms — including one that was paid $100,000 in taxpayer funds — to advance its damning narrative about the Crumbleys to the media. These PR contracts did not come to light until last month when Dezsi sought a new trial or conviction reversal for Jennifer Crumbley, alleging PR firms helped unfairly taint the jury pool and gave his client an impossible shot at being acquitted from the get-go.
According to court documents, one of those firms, Moment Strategies, which is run by former Detroit journalist Alexis Wiley, was paid $100,000 over two years for work on the case. Wiley has defended her handling of the case and the prosecutor’s office, saying Jennifer Crumbley got convicted over her own behavior, not PR.
Meanwhile, it is still not known how much was paid to the first firm that the prosecutor’s office hired just hours after the tragedy: Identity, a national crisis response outfit that helped coordinate 40 one-on-one interviews in one week alone between the prosecutor’s office and national media outlets.
There’s a pending Freedom of Information lawsuit filed by a former Oxford parent who is trying to find out how much was paid to that national PR firm. To date, the prosecutor’s office has not supplied the information, though it contends the PR help was crucial in a precedent-setting case of this magnitude.
“The Oxford High School shooting drew immediate national and international attention. False rumors began spreading quickly. Schools across Michigan and across the country were closed because of false threats,” Williams has previously stated. “The Oakland County Executive and the Oakland County Board of Commissioners immediately provided the resources needed to get reliable information to the public and the media. We owed that to the victims and the public.”
Williams continued: “Jennifer Crumbley was convicted for what she did and didn’t do, and the defense cannot change those facts. … She was convicted on the facts, not a media narrative.”
Dezsi disagrees, maintaining the prosecution crossed legal and ethical lines to convince the public that it had a strong case against Jennifer Crumbley, when it knew otherwise. Specifically, as he had planned to argue Friday before the judge’s late Thursday opinion, the prosecution has tried to argue that Crumbley had a legal duty to protect the Oxford students, when, he maintains, no such legal duty exists — much like a person who fails to stop a robbery or prevent a person from jumping in front of a train cannot be charged with a crime.
More: Judge keeps one key issue alive in Jennifer Crumbley’s quest for new trial
“Simply stated,” Dezsi argues, “the prosecution is advancing a new policy argument never before recognized by our courts. And what the prosecution’s case lacks in the law, they have attempted to make up for in the court of public opinion.”
Contact Tresa Baldas: [email protected]
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Prosecutor had family ties to producer of Hulu film on the Crumbleys
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