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How the community of Oxford, Mich., is starting to recover from school shooting

AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:

Today in Michigan, friends and family gathered to remember 16-year-old Tate Myre, one of four students killed during last week's school shooting in the town of Oxford. The funeral was set - the funeral for 17-year-old Madisyn Baldwin was held over the weekend. There are two more services to come. Oxford is some 40 miles north of Detroit, and NPR's Cheryl Corley joins us from there. And, Cheryl, first, can you talk a bit about the scene or maybe the atmosphere in that community today?

CHERYL CORLEY, BYLINE: Yeah, Audie. Well, it's very solemn. If you drive throughout the community, there are flags at half-staff. There are blue and yellow ribbons tied on trees throughout the community. Sarah Budreau (ph), who has lived in the area for about 20 years - she's a former high school counselor and administrator at the nearby town of Lake Orion. And she was driving near Oxford high school when the shooting actually occurred. So today, as we stood at the makeshift memorial outside of the school, she said that there are just layers and layers of trauma here.

SARAH BUDREAU: There's those kids who were there and experienced it. And then you have the families, the friends, the community, the students who were in the building. You know, it's just - everybody around is grieving. So - and they're just trying to get through each day.

CORLEY: And the funerals for Hana St. Juliana and Justin Shilling are to come next.

CORNISH: In the meantime, the accused shooter, 15-year-old Ethan Crumbley, who has been charged with murder - in fact, there are multiple charges against his parents as well. I understand Michigan's attorney general pledged her help again today. What might that look like?

CORLEY: Well, you know, it's really hard to say what it would look like because she has offered her services, and the school district decided to reject those services. They said that they had an investigator of their own that could do that job. However, Dana Nessel, the state's attorney general, said that she would work with the office, hand in glove with the prosecutor, Oakland County prosecutor Karen McDonald, as they look closer not just at the shooting but at the events leading up to it. And she says there's just lots for everyone here.

DANA NESSEL: There's lots of ways for us to receive the information that we need. We'll start, of course, with the criminal investigation. There's a lot of different materials between witness testimony and videotape footage and photographs - many other kinds of evidence that we already have - that will assist us in this process. And then moving forward, you know, we'll have to see where things go.

CORNISH: I'm struck by all of the offers of help and community support. Can you talk about what it's looked like?

CORLEY: Well, there's really been an outpouring of support - lots of donations coming in, including clear backpacks for students. But primarily, it's been about raising money. So here's an example. Scott Taylor is the co-owner of Sick Pizza. That's a restaurant that just opened up here six months ago. And Taylor says they shut down normal operations. They had lots of volunteers come in to make pizzas for donations. And he's really raised nearly $82,000. He plans to raise more. And he says it's just important for him to do that, that everyone here is - it's very important for people to try to do healing in some sort of way.

CORNISH: That's NPR's Cheryl Corley. Thank you for your reporting.

CORLEY: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

Cheryl Corley is a Chicago-based NPR correspondent who works for the National Desk. She primarily covers criminal justice issues as well as breaking news in the Midwest and across the country.
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