A Tennessee court ruled on Thursday that a group of parents can intervene in the legal fight to block the release of the manifesto of the transgender-identifying woman who murdered six people at a Christian school in Nashville earlier this year.
The Tennessee Court of Appeals said that the Covenant School, Covenant Presbyterian Church, and parents at the school had standing to intervene in efforts to block the manifesto’s release, but did not rule on whether to block the release of the shooter’s writings.
“In this appeal, the only issues properly before this Court concern the trial court’s grant of intervention to Intervenors — any issues concerning the disclosure of the sought records had not yet been adjudicated at the time this appeal was filed and are not before this Court,” Judge Thomas Frierson wrote.
The church, school, and some parents of kids at the school have argued that the shooter’s writings should remain sealed for security and privacy purposes.
The ruling is the latest update in the legal battle over the manifesto of the 28-year-old woman who went on a rampage inside The Covenant School, a Presbyterian-affiliated pre-K-6 school, where she killed six people on March 28, 2023. The victims of the attack included three 9-year-olds — Evelyn Dieckhaus, 9; Hallie Scruggs, 9; William Kinney, 9 — and three staff members — headmaster Katherine Koonce, 60; Cynthia Peak, 61; and Mike Hill, 61.
The Metropolitan Police Department and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation denied open records requests from The Daily Wire, the Tennessee Star, and other outlets, citing that it was an ongoing investigation — even though the shooter was killed by police during the attack.
Michael Patrick Leahy, the CEO of Star News Digital Media, said that the Tennessee Star may consider an appeal to the Tennessee Supreme Court.
“The Chancery Court ruling to allow the intervention was a clear violation of Tennessee statutes, as was today’s ruling by the Court of Appeals. We are evaluating our options, which may include directly appealing this faulty decision to the Tennessee Supreme Court,” he said in a statement.
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Portions of the manifesto leaked last month showing the killer claiming the kids at the school had “white privilege” and calling them “crackers.”
“Kill those kids!!! Those crackers going to private fancy schools with those fancy khakis + sports backpacks w/ their daddies mustangs + convertables [sic],” she wrote in her diary.
“I wish to shoot you weakass d***s w/ your mop yellow hair, wanna kill all you little crackers! Bunch of little f*****s w/ your white privileges,” she wrote.
Three photographs of the pages of the shooter’s diary were obtained by commentator Steven Crowder, who reported that his investigative team independently confirmed the authenticity of the images. The Daily Wire’s sources have also confirmed the authenticity of the pages.
The case now heads back to the the Chancery Court for Davidson County in Nashville.