If you’ll recall, part of the so-called manifesto, written by Covenant School shooter Audrey Hale, was leaked to right-wing hate monger Steven Crowder. Crowder then posted the images to the Nazi-infested social network X, formerly known as Twitter. If this had been any other school shooter, Crowder and his ilk would have been making excuses for the shooter to protect their sacrosanct 2nd Amendment. However, Audrey Hale was said to be trans, identifying themselves as Aiden Hale. In a typical ‘hey, look over there’ move, conservative content creators blamed the shooting on Hale’s gender identity rather than the fact Hale legally amassed a cache of assault weapons prior to the shooting.
It was then asserted that the images of the manifesto were leaked to Crowder by someone who belonged to the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD), as a Metro Nashville police car can be seen in the background of one of the photos. This resulted in an internal investigation, where seven police officers were placed on ‘administrative assignment’. When I posted about the investigation, my fear was that the investigation would be stonewalled by a blue wall of silence. It seems my fears were not unfounded.
In the middle of the investigation, four of the suspended officers were returned to duty, back in November. Then, a little over a week ago, the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department declared they “exhausted all possible investigative avenues” into the matter before dropping the investigation entirely.
The MNPD even unintentionally admitted how toothless the investigation was to begin with. They stated that a former detective had the images on his phone as part of his duty during the day of the shooting. The former detective declined to speak with the MNPD, with the police department saying they can’t “compel statements or cooperation from former employees.”
Excuse me? Forgive me for being a filthy civilian, but isn’t that what search warrants are for? Some may say a crime has not been committed to justify a search warrant, but at the time of the leak, wasn’t the investigation into the shooting still ongoing? Didn’t the leak interfere with the investigation? Is that not obstruction?
To be fair, I’m not omniscient, nor do I know all the ins and out of Tennessee law. But on the surface, this appears to betray the trust people are supposed to have in the police. The leaking of the manifesto was nothing more than an attempt to further marginalize the trans community that was fueled by nothing more than hate. This was not an act designed to protect and serve, but rather to protect and serve a bigoted cop’s prejudices and fragile ego.
(Sources)
- Four Nashville officers return to work after Covenant School shooting document leak
- Nashville police say they’ve ‘exhausted all available investigative avenues’ into leak of school shooter’s writings
- Cops Can’t Determine Who Leaked Writings From School Shooter
***
(Hey, everyone. Trench here. The crime stories I write about tend to drive advertisers away. This site does cost money to maintain, so if you appreciate my work, please consider becoming a monthly supporter at Patreon, or making a one-time donation at Ko-Fi. Thank you.)
Real Crime with Trench Reynolds 