A Nashville, Tennessee court is set to hear long-awaited arguments over whether or not to release documents that belonged to the transgender-identifying shooter who murdered six people at the Covenant School, which have been kept sealed from the public for more than a year.
The court proceedings, overseen by Judge I’Ashea L. Myles, will decide whether a trove of documents belonging to the shooter, who took the lives of three children and three staff members at the private Christian academy on March 27th, 2023, will be made available to the public.
Included is not only the shooter’s manifesto, but also 14 different home videos, 20 journals, a suicide note, and a psych folder with medical information about the shooter. There are also three folders with information on school shootings and firearms courses, as well as a memoir and notes written by the shooter.
The hearing hinges on the Tennessee Public Records Act, which controls what documents should be classified as public records, as well as which ones should not. Five different parties are part of the suit — the Tennessee Firearms Association, The Tennessean, The Tennessee Star, Republican state legislator Todd Gardenhire, and the National Police Association.
On the other side is a group of families from the Covenant School that filed a motion to block the release of the documents, arguing that their release could further traumatize those who were personally affected by the shooting.
Metro Nashville Police Department Chief John Drake previously said that he would release records pertaining to the case before later backtracking. Multiple entities have submitted public records requests, including The Daily Wire, but all have been declined.
A small portion of the manifesto was leaked in November by podcaster Steven Crowder, who obtained three photographs of the alleged manifesto. The pages included racial slurs against white children as well as an itinerary for “death day,” which articulated her intent to have a “high death count.”
David Rausch, the director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, has stated that the shooter did not write about politics or social issues, with her writings largely dedicated to idolizing previous school shooters. Rausch also says the documents show shooter planned the attack on the Covenant School for months.
Judicial Watch, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of the groups, has also called for the public release of the documents and charged that the secrecy is due to politics.
“We urge the court to place the public’s right to know above any political considerations,” the organization’s president, Tom Fitton, said on Monday.