School Shootings and Legal Accountability

Families of victims of the Oxford and Apalachee school shootings are pushing for increased criminal liability for parents, pointing to detailed evidence in the Oxford case — months of disturbing texts including a “time to shoot up the school” message, a student’s in‑class weapons behavior and a math worksheet scrawled with violent imagery and pleas for help, a roughly 12‑minute counselor meeting after which the parents refused to take the student home and the school did not check his backpack, and the mother’s trip with him to a shooting range three days before the attack followed by a text reading “lol i'm not mad you have to learn not to get caught.” Victims’ parents say such failures underscore that the country is “going backwards” on prevention as efforts to expand mental‑health support and tighten gun laws are being rolled back.