Nashville school shooter Audrey Hale wrote in a diary entry that she hoped to make the Columbine shooters proud when she opened fire on her former Christian elementary school, killing six people.

“I want my massacre to end in a way that Eric (Harris) and Dylan (Klebold) would be proud of,” Hale wrote in handwriting at the bottom of a lined page of her diary, according to evidence photos of the book obtained and published by the Tennessee Star.

“April 1999 – the year Columbine/NBK was born… (04/20/1999). The year Aiden was born… (03/27/23!),” Hale wrote in another entry, referring to the male name Aiden that she chose for herself.

Hale, a 28-year-old trans artist, stormed into Covenant School on March 27, 2023, and shot three 9-year-old children and three adult staff members before she was killed by police officers.

She planned the “massacre” months in advance and described her suicidal thoughts in the diary entries – which were at the center of a highly contentious legal battle between the publisher of the Tennessee Star and the families of the victims.

“Idc (I don’t care) if people die since I’m the shooter because I’m going to die too,” Hale scribbled on another page. “I would kill to die… My only true motivation = mass suicide plus death (infinite).”

The diary is full of largely confused ramblings, doodles, and descriptions of self-hatred and plans to raid the private school with murderers.

Hale’s final entry on the day of the mass shooting is titled “Day of Death” and is next to a drawing of a gun.

“Today is the day. The day is finally here! I can’t believe it. I don’t know how I made it this far but here I am,” she wrote.

“I’m a little nervous but also excited, I’ve been excited for the last two weeks,” she continued. “There were several occasions where I could have been caught, especially in the summer of 2021. None of that matters now. I’m almost an hour and 7 miles away.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I’m ready. I hope my victims aren’t,” Hale scribbled emotionlessly.

The entries were among 90 pages of text from Hale’s notebook published by The Star on Tuesday.

The local newspaper obtained the diary entries from a source familiar with the investigation into Hale in June 2024 and argued that it had the right to publish the results under the First Amendment.

But the parents of the three children killed by Hale – William Kinney, Evelyn Dieckhaus and Hallie Scruggs – have asked a judge to prohibit the media from publishing the killer’s writings.

“I will not stand idly by while this shooter’s writings are published in any way. This mass murderer must not speak from the grave,” Erin Kinney, William’s mother, wrote in an affidavit.

The families’ lawyers argued that they owned the copyright to the writings because Hale’s parents gave the estate to the victims’ families after the shooting.

Free speech advocates and media outlets like The Star have also sued law enforcement agencies to demand the release of all of Hale’s writings, arguing that the public has a right to know the motives behind the senseless killings.

The entries released Tuesday came from just one of 20 diaries Hale kept, along with a suicide note and unpublished memoirs.