Newly released FBI documents have shed a disturbing light on the calculated planning behind the 2023 Nashville school shooting, revealing the killer's twisted rationale for targeting one school over another.
The Chilling Calculations of a Killer
Audrey Elizabeth Hale, the 28-year-old perpetrator of the March 27, 2023, massacre, meticulously weighed her options before the attack. According to the FBI files, Hale agonized over whether to attack The Covenant School or I.T. Creswell Middle School, a school she attended in Grades 5 and 6 that has a predominantly Black student population.
In handwritten notes described as "tomes of terror," Hale listed advantages and disadvantages for each potential target. A primary factor in her decision was a perverted sense of racial calculation. She expressed concern that attacking the mostly Black school would "influence rasist [sic] white shooters."
Hale wrote that targeting Creswell was a disadvantage because it was a "(Predominantly) black school (black people I love)." She further noted, "Black community in despair [and] suffering (I don't want to cause that) = don't want to harm them = dread. Black friends [and] black community will hate me."
Why Covenant School Was Chosen
Ultimately, Hale settled on The Covenant School, a private Christian elementary school she attended from kindergarten to Grade 4. Her stated reasons were stark and hate-filled. She targeted Covenant precisely because it was a "predominantly white school" and "white people I hate!" As a Christian institution, it also fit her stated hatred of religion.
The familiarity of the school's layout from her childhood years was another tactical advantage she noted. On the morning of March 27, 2023, Hale, armed with a 9mm carbine and other firearms, entered the school and killed three 9-year-old students and three adults before being shot and killed by responding Nashville police officers within 15 minutes.
A Quest for Notoriety and a Troubled Path
Investigators believe Hale, who identified as transgender and used the name Aiden Hale, was driven by a desire for notoriety and media attention. Born female, Hale began identifying as male in her early twenties. At the time of the shooting, she was a graduate of the Nossi College of Art & Design, working as an illustrator and graphic designer while living with her parents.
Despite being under care for an emotional disorder, Hale had legally acquired seven firearms. She had no prior criminal record. Her parents told detectives that Hale had felt accepted by Black culture after joining a mostly Black basketball team in her youth, which may have influenced her later writings.
The release of these documents provides a harrowing glimpse into the premeditated nature of the attack, which ranks among the deadliest school shootings in Tennessee history. The revelations continue to fuel discussions about mental health, firearm access, and the dark allure of infamy that drives some mass killers.
