A journalist from the Tennessee Star is being summoned to appear in court and faces jail time for publishing journal writings of transgender shooter Audrey Hale, sparking freedom of the press concerns.
The article revealed that Hale, who shot and killed six people at the Covenant Elementary School in March 2023, wrote about her ‘imaginary penis’ and how she would ‘kill’ to get puberty blockers weeks before her horrific act.
For more than a year, Nashville Chancellor I’Ashea Myles has been presiding over a public records case wherein the plaintiffs are suing to get the right to release documents related to the shooting. Families of the victims are on the exact opposite side, trying to bury the documents and keep them out of the public eye.
But since the case is ongoing, Myles is claiming that the Tennessee Star may have published ‘certain purported documents and information’ that should have remained under seal.
At Myle’s request, Tennessee Star editor-in-chief Michael Patrick Leahy will appear in court Monday to explain why his news outlet didn’t violate the court order.
Michael Patrick Leahy, CEO of Star News Digital Media and editor-in-chief of the Tennessee Star
Nashville Chancellor I’Ashea Myles, who’s been presiding over the public records fight over Audrey Hale’s manifesto
Michael Patrick Leahy, left, is the CEO of Star News Digital Media and editor-in-chief of the Tennessee Star. Nashville Chancellor I’Ashea Myles has ordered Leahy to appear in court because of the Star’s reporting on Audrey Hale’s journal writings.
Leahy, who also serves as CEO of Star News Digital Media, publisher of the Tennessee Star, claims his outlet has done nothing wrong throughout the course of its reporting.
The Star has claimed a June 5 story didn’t actually publish any of the leaked images of her journal entries but just snippets from it, reported the Associated Press.
‘This could raise First Amendment issues,’ said Deborah Fisher, Tennessee Coalition for Open Government’s executive director.
Jeff Clark, a former US attorney, also sided with Leahy, saying he was just doing a journalist’s job and getting crucial information about the shooting.
Leahy ‘is in jeopardy in Tennessee state court for trying to get out the Covenant Killer Audrey Hale’s “manifesto.” And presumably other info about her,’ Clark wrote on X.
‘The American people deserve to know the details of how Hale was radicalized by the trans agenda. And the victims’ family especially deserve to learn that information.’
Hale, 28, was a transgender artist, who identified as a male named Aiden, shot her way into the Tennessee elementary school in March 2023, killing three adults and three nine-year-olds, before responding officers killed her.
Officers found her writings in the car she drove to the elementary school, and the Star reported on ‘nearly four dozen images of notebook pages written by Hale’ provided by a source familiar with the investigation.
Hale wrote about anger toward her parents, how she hated her conservative Christian upbringing, and how she had suffered because hormone blockers were not available when she was a child.
One of her entries was ‘My Imaginary Penis’ and included a crude drawing, according to the Tennessee Star.
‘My penis exists in my head. I swear to god I’m a male,’ Hale wrote in the papers.
She then wrote about her desire to have a penis so she could have sex with a woman, in her assumed identity as Aiden.
She wrote about how using that name on a job application for a delivery position led to issues with the company’s background check.
Hale also said that being raised as a girl was ‘torture.’
She worried that high school classmates would call her ‘dyke or a f*‘, she wrote.
That all changed when she learned about transgenderism in her early 20s.
‘I finally found the answer — that changing one’s gender is possible,’ wrote Hale.
After the Star’s reporting throughout June, the Nashville’s Metropolitan Police said in a statement that ‘it is concerned about the alleged leak, and we, like others, would like to know from where it came.’
Immediately following the shooting, Nashville’s police chief John Drake said Hale’s manifesto as well as the hand-drawn maps found in her car would eventually be made public.
Now, despite the leaks, both city police and the FBI say the material shouldn’t be released because the information could damage any potential investigation.
In a statement to The Center Square, Leahy said he plans to defend his and his outlet’s rights to publish relevant information about the shooting.
‘Yes, I intend to appear in court on Monday at 11 am, along with my attorneys, Nick Barry with America First Legal and Daniel Horwitz, a nationally recognized First Amendment attorney based here in Nashville,’ Leahy told The Center Square Sunday.
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