The Nashville, Tennessee, Police Department addressed documents published Monday by commentator Steven Crowder purporting to be the manifesto of Nashville school shooter Audrey Hale.
The police statement did not confirm whether the documents published by Crowder were, in fact, part of the school shooter’s manifesto.
“The [Metropolitan Nashville Police Department] is in communication with the Metropolitan Department of Law as an investigation, begun this morning, continues into the dissemination of three photographs of writings during an on-line discussion about Covenant School,” the police said in a statement on Monday afternoon. “The photographs are not MNPD crime scene images.”
“The police department has been in contact with a representative of Covenant families,” the statement continued. “Police department counselors are available to assist them in coping with the emotional trauma caused by the dissemination.”
Pressed by The Daily Signal, Nashville police spokeswoman Brooke Reese said that writings from the shooter are part of “ongoing legal action” and, therefore, the department cannot say whether Crowder’s documents are from Hale’s manifesto.
The announcement came hours after Crowder posted photographs of pages he said were part of the manifesto of school shooter Hale, a 28-year-old woman who killed three students and three adults when she opened fire inside the Nashville-based Covenant School on March 27.
Police shot Hale as she continued to fire inside the Christian school. Soon after, authorities said they had discovered a manifesto allegedly written by Hale and revealed that Hale identified as a transgender man.
Nashville police had repeatedly told The Daily Signal on Monday morning and afternoon that they could not yet confirm whether the alleged manifesto photographs that Crowder published were authentic.
And the FBI told The Daily Signal: “As this matter is being addressed by the courts, the FBI will not be commenting on the reported documents.”
Those pages include phrases suggesting Hale was acting out of hatred for white people, including “Kill those kids!!! Those crackers. Going to private fancy schools with those fancy khakis and sports backpacks with their daddies mustangs and convertibles. F— you little shits. I wish to shoot your weak ass d—s with your mop yellow hair, wanna kill all you little crackers!!! Bunch of little faggots with your white privileges. F— you faggots.”
Hale killed three children and three adults—Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs and William Kinney, all 9; Cynthia Peak, 61; Katherine Koonce, 60; and Mike Hill, 61, according to Fox News.
Armed with two rifles and a handgun, the killer shot through the school’s locked door at about 10 a.m. that day, Fox reported. Hale then went upstairs to the second floor, where she reportedly opened fire.
Police officers first received the 9-1-1 call at 10:13 a.m., and Metro Nashville Police Officers Rex Engelbert and Michael Collazo were among the dozens of officers who rushed to the building, The Tennessean reported. By 10:24 a.m., Engelbert and Collazo had taken out the shooter.
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