Nearly a year after a transgender man killed six people, including three children, in a Nashville school massacre, a judge has ordered the FBI to release documents that could explain the motive.
On Friday, U.S. District Court Judge Aleta Traugera federal ordered the FBI to provide the news media the manifesto of Covenant School shooter Audrey Hale, as well as other documents.
The order was part of a lawsuit filed by Star News Digital Media Inc., the parent company of The Tennessee Star, and directs that the documents must be made available for a “private review.”
Read: Nashville Covenant School Shooter Audrey Hale’s Manifesto Released By Steven Crowder
“The court’s order today is a significant victory for the public’s right to know about the motives of Audrey Elizabeth Hale, who murdered six innocent Nashvillians at the Covenant School on March 27, 2023,” Tennessee Star Editor-in-Chief Michael Patrick Leahy said in a statement.
Just The News reported that the news outlet sued the FBI last May, asserting the feds violated the First Amendment by not complying with several Freedom of Information Act requests to obtain the manifesto.
In the ruling, the judge also noted, “The court also finds that the significant public interest in both the requested materials and the law enforcement objectives asserted by the FBI support in camera review and that no showing has been made that the requested materials will be so voluminous that they would pose a significant danger to judicial economy.”
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As the Tampa Free Press reported in November, conservative social media personality Steven Crowder received and released parts of Hale’s alleged writings.
“Kill those kids!!! Those crackers going to private fancy schools,” Hale, a former student at the school, reportedly wrote. Wanna kill all you little crackers!!! Bunch of little f*gg*ts w/ your white privlages [sic].”
Conservative commentators have long argued the FBI and the Biden administration were covering up the manifesto in order to downplay violence committed by transgenders and that the decision not to release the records did not make sense because there was no ongoing investigation after police killed Hale, the lone suspect, at the scene.
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