Tennessee State Representative Gino Bulso (R-Brentwood) filed HB 1653 on Monday to compel Tennessee law enforcement to release materials and evidence related to the Covenant School shooting, including the manifesto written by Audrey Elizabeth Hale, who fatally shot three 9-year-old students and three faculty at the school in March 2023.
Bulso’s bill would require “all state and local law enforcement” to comply with a request from any member of the Tennessee General Assembly seeking “a copy of all records collected by the agency, including, but not limited to, all writings and medical, toxicology, and other reports, of a perpetrator involved in a school shooting incident that occurred at a public or private school in this state in March of 2023.”
The bill would take effect immediately after becoming law, meaning Bulso’s effort could lead to the release of Hale’s manifesto this year, should it pass the Tennessee General Assembly.
Another bill introduced by Bulso, HB 1652, would strip courts in Tennessee of their ability to restrict information from Tennessee lawmakers, potentially removing a roadblock to securing the manifesto’s release via HB 1653.
A lawsuit, filed by Star News Digital Media Inc., the parent company of The Tennessee Star, which seeks to compel the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department (MNPD) to release the manifesto written by Hale, currently awaits a court date at the Davidson County Chancery Court.
In November, the Tennessee Court of Appeals ruled in Nashville that a group of parents can intervene in the lawsuit. Michael Patrick Leahy, the Editor-in-Chief of The Star, said he was considering options to appeal the decision.
The legislative attempt to gain access to Hale’s documents and other information comes following the publication of three pages of leaked materials from the killer’s manifesto by conservative commentator and comedian Steven Crowder last year.
Following that leak, Star News Digital Media Inc. made filings in its separate lawsuit, which seeks to compel the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to release the manifesto, seeking limited discovery to require the FBI to formally acknowledge the manifesto was written by Hale.
The Star, MNPD, and other media outlets have independently confirmed the writings are Hale’s, but the FBI claimed releasing even one page of Hale’s manifesto would jeopardize ongoing investigations due to the individuals and locations named in the manifesto. The Star News Digital Media Inc. filing notes the only names mentioned in the three pages published by Crowder seem to reference a Tennessee gun store and Hale’s grandmother.
The Covenant School recently delayed the return of students and faculty to its Burton Hills campus, where Hale, a female who identified as a transgender male, committed the school shooting on March 27, 2023. School officials noted the trauma generated by the event for students and faculty when announcing their decision, and explained the school’s new return date of April 15 would give those affected more time to process the event.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Georgia Star News, The Virginia Star, and the Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
The leadership at these agencies are withholding information from the public at the behest of someone or something. Creating more government regulation will not fix that. I doubt very seriously that what they are hiding is anything more than the looney left supports violence to further their sick world view.
What is Metro hiding? This is not about “protecting the children”. Protecting the children would be addressing the causes, what ever they are. Protecting the children would be alerting all citizens, even other mothers and fathers, about how this happened, what to look for in family members who may be struggling, what to look for in a secure building (and a not so secure building) – how do we protect ourselves. What is in the Manifesto/papers that Metro is so afraid of?
Hey Gino.. how about making an effort to release the records on the bad behavior of YOUR OWN COLLEAGUES in the Legislature???