Former inmates make bold claims about what Mackenzie Shirilla is really like in prison
Topics: Mackenzie Shirilla, Netflix, True crime, Ohio
Thomas Bamford
Featured Image Credit: Law&Crime Trials
Topics: Mackenzie Shirilla, Netflix, True crime, Ohio
A former inmate who shared time behind bars with convicted killer Mackenzie Shirilla has revealed what she's really like.
Many of the viewers have made their own minds up on main character of Netflix's The Crash, but the general consensus is overwhelmingly negative, with people commenting on her as unremorseful, entitled and very much guilty.
Shrilla was sentenced to 15 years in prison back in 2023 following her conviction the murder of her then boyfriend Dominic Russo and friend Davion Flanagan.
She was found guilty of four counts of murder in what prosecutors called an “intentional act," where she drove a car at 100 miles per hour directly into a wall. Black box data showed that Shirilla, only 17 at the time, was pressing the accelerator up until the car hit the wall. Shirilla has insisted that she blacked out and never meant to kill them.
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Shirilla’s boyfriend, 20-year-old Dominic Russo, and his friend, 19-year-old Davion Flanagan, were pronounced dead at the scene.
Despite what you might think of the protagonist of The Crash, ex-Ohio prison inmate Kat Crowder has shared her experience of sharing time behind bars with Shirilla on Tiktok, claiming that she's an entirely different person to how she's made out in the doc.
She said: “When I was in prison with her, it was at the beginning of her sentence, and the Mackenzie that came on to Netflix was not the same Mackenzie that I witnessed in prison.
“She thrived for fame, even when I was in prison with her, she thought she was going to be the representative of the prison.
“Let me tell you something, Mackenzie Shirilla did not walk around that prison yard with an ounce of remorse.
"Mackenzie did not walk around that prison yard thinking about those lost loved ones that she claimed to think about every single day. [She] walked around the prison thinking, how is she going to get in with the cool kids?”
Kat is now out of prison, living with her daughter in Nashville. Shirilla was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole in 15 years. She received two life in prison terms, one for murdering Russo and another for killing Flanagan.
Kat continued: “When I was in there with Mackenzie, all she cared about was doing her makeup, walking around in the yard with her one or two friends that were also very similar to her: young girls, social media influencer wannabes, thinking that it was a high school popularity contest.
"She was starting to hang out with the lifers who were more institutionalised and harder,” Kat added.
‘Mackenzie had everything you can imagine in prison and more. All the makeup, all the limited item stuff that you had to buy, Mackenzie had it, her mum enabled her.”
She later added in an interview with NewsNationNow that she wanted to be like "Regina George" from Mean Girls.
Kate said that other inmates had suggested that Shirilla allegedly said she was high during the crash.
“I do say that she wanted to be like Regina George. I mean, just the way that she did her makeup, the way that she, I mean, it was like she was going out to a club or something."
The case surrounding Shirilla is detailed in Netflix's new documentary, The Crash, which features interviews with those attached to the case which shocked the world in 2022.
Shirilla had been just 17 years old, driving home from a party with her boyfriend, Dom, and his friend, Davion, when she crashed her Toyota Camry at 100mph into a brick building in Strongsville, Ohio.
Dom and Davion did not survive, and the crash left Shirilla with serious injuries, including a lacerated liver and kidney, and broken ribs.
Shirilla was charged with murder, which led her to facing Judge Nancy Russo, a judge who told the teen she was 'literal hell on wheels'. Russo accused Shirilla's actions of being five things: "Controlled, methodical, deliberate, intentional and purposeful.”
"This was not reckless driving. This was murder. The video clearly shows the purpose and intent of the defendant. She chose a course of death and destruction that day," the judge said.
Mackenzie Shirilla's lawyer has been approached for comment