Leaked Nashville manifesto shows shooter obsessed with changing genders

The Nashville mass shooter agonized over gender identity, wallowed in self-pity, ripped Christianity, and plotted cold-blooded murder in the weeks before opening fire at the Covenant School, killing three children and three staff members.

Excerpts from the expletive-laden manifesto of 28-year-old Audrey Elizabeth Hale released Tuesday include: “If God won’t give me a boy body in heaven then Jesus is a f——-”; “I can’t be happy. I am meant to die,” and “No Regrets by the gun!!!”

The long-awaited document was published not by the police but by the Tennessee Star, which said it acquired copies of the journal’s contents legally in June from an unnamed source.

“We legally obtained writings by Audrey Elizabeth Hale, [Metropolitan Nashville Police Department] investigation documents, and MNPD crime scene photos from a source familiar with the MNPD investigation in June 2024,” said Michael Patrick Leahy, the Star’s editor-in-chief, in a Tuesday statement.

“These documents and photos have helped us inform the public about the underlying reasons for this heinous attack, and have helped drive the public discussion of what should be done to prevent such acts of violence in the future,” he said. “We have documented a massive failure of the mental health system as a root cause of Hale’s reprehensible actions.”

Hale left behind numerous notebooks, but the 90 pages released by the Star were dated January to March 2023, immediately before her March 27, 2023, attack on the school. She was gunned down by police 14 minutes after the rampage began.

The notebook filled with tortured writings and drawings showed she was depressed about not being a boy, calling it “a terrible feeling to know I am nothing of the gender I was born of” and “I am the most unhappy boy alive.”

“I will be of no use of love for any girl if I don’t have what they need: Boy’s body/male gender,” she said.

Hale fantasized about being male, referring to herself by the boys’ names “Aidan” and “Tony.” In an entry entitled, “My Imaginary Penis,” she said she imagined being a man having intercourse by enacting sex scenes with her stuffed animals.

Hale, who had attended Covenant School, expressed disdain for her parents’ Christian beliefs, saying that “conservative religion gay s—- makes them believe that the child they are given should stay that way.”

She also struggled with unrequited love, writing in an entry dated March 13, 2023: “I said my last goodbye to you today (that post was not a post; it was my suicide note). I’ll be dead in 2 weeks!!!”

The entry went on: “So as much as my heart goes out to you, no longer will I bother you about how much I love you that’s not necessary to your heart … All pain must end someday … SO I MUST DIE!!!”

She added: “I love you but you can’t tell me that. (Although I wish you could … ).”

Hale also discussed her mental-health situation, claiming that she had an autism diagnosis and insisting she was not bipolar. She said she had a therapist, a possible reference to her status as a mental patient at Vanderbilt University Medical Center at age 22.

Hale was evaluated three times for in-patient commitment, twice after expressing suicidal ideation and once for an eating disorder, but avoided being committed all three times. Instead she received outpatient treatment, according to a July 1 report in the Star.

Most of Hale’s writings focused on her personal struggles, not politics. An exception came a month before the attack, when she went on a political rant about a lack of respect for transgender people as well as gun owners.

“So now in America, it makes one a criminal to have a gun or be transgender, or non-binary,” concluding that “with no rights, anyone’s country is a s——- dictatorship.”

Conservative podcast host Steven Crowder posted three leaked pages from the manifesto in November indicating that Hale was motivated by hatred of White people, including children, even though she herself was White.

Hale’s writings include “wanna kill all you little crackers!!! Bunch of little f——— w/your white privileges” and “I hope I have a high death count. Ready to die ha ha,” which was signed “Aiden.”

Hale also made statements such as “No brown girls, no love” and “Brown love is the most beautiful kind.”

Two of Mr. Crowder’s three pages were not among the excerpts published Tuesday by the Star, though the newspaper only published one journal, not all of Hale’s writings.

The Star said the document dubbed “The Covenant Killer’s 2023 Journal” should be viewed not as a manifesto, but as “a collection of writings in which Hale sporadically wrote her thoughts in the months and years proceeding her devastating attack.”

Numerous media outlets, including the Star, have sued the city and FBI to compel the release of Hale’s journals. The Covenant School and parents of students have intervened to stop the documents from being published.

A Nashville police spokesperson told The Washington Times that “the MNPD continues to work to determine responsibility for this dissemination,” and pointed to the June 13 declaration of Lt. Alfredo Arevalo filed in Davidson County court.

In the court document, Lt. Arevalo said that Garet Davidson, then an officer in the Office of Professional Accountability, was the only person who had the key and combination to the locked safe containing the complete case-file hard drive.

Mr. Davidson resigned in December.

Since then, he has discussed the case in media appearances, including on the Tennessee Star’s podcast. The Star has also published scoops about the investigation that include quotations from the case file.

Lt. Arevalo all but blamed Mr. Davidson for the leaks, saying that “the information in the Tennessee Star stories is the same information that was in the case file in November 2023 when I gave it to Mr. Davidson to store in his office at OPA.”

“I am appalled that this open investigative case file has been leaked to the media,” said Lt. Arevalo. “I am saddened by the impact that this leak must have had on the victims and families of the Covenant School shooting.”

Media outlets have argued that Hale’s writings should be released in the public interest, noting that the manifestos of other mass shooters have been made available far more quickly, while Nashville police have countered that the criminal investigation is ongoing.

Hale was prolific.

Nashville police and federal agents “seized 20 additional journals written by Hale between 2007 and 2022 at the Nashville residence she shared with her parents” hours after the shooting.

“Those journals are said to contain about 1,000 pages. In addition, numerous videos, a suicide note, and duplicate thumb drives containing information she may have wanted police to find were seized that afternoon,” the Star said.