Tom Pappert, lead reporter at The Tennessee Star, said he believes attorneys for Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) may have reached a financial arrangement with multiple entities involved in the Covenant School killer case in order to “protect” the medical institution’s reputation amid shocking revelations connecting VUMC to the killer, Audrey Elizabeth Hale.
On June 7, The Star was the first to report that Hale was a 22-year patient of VUMC from 2001 until the time of the horrific school shooting on March 27, 2023.
The Star also learned that Hale expressed suicidal ideation and homicidal ideation to VUMC staff while under the institution’s care, including, “Thoughts of killing Dad in and struggles with mental health. Recent thoughts of going into a school and shooting a bunch of people.”
Last week, Tennessee Chancery Court Judge I’Ashea L. Myles ruled that not one page of Hale’s materials will be released to the public, citing the copyright claims of the parents she earlier allowed to intervene in the lawsuit.
Myles’ ruling stems from her May 2023 decision to allow parents from the Covenant School, the Covenant School, and the Covenant Presbyterian Church to intervene in the case after Hale’s family claimed they assigned them the copyright of her written materials.
The intervenors say they own the copyright to Hale’s works through an entity known as the Covenant Children’s Trust.
Pappert, who has reported extensively on The Star’s obtaining of dozens of documents related to the killer’s case, reached out to an attorney representing the Covenant Children’s Trust, asking if the group had received any type of financial compensation or was approached by VUMC to discuss its potential civil liability over its treatment of Hale.
In Tennessee, there is a duty to warn law medical professionals must follow if a patient makes credible threats to individuals or other entities. The law at the time of the March 27, 2023, shooting provided a one-year statute of limitations for civil liability, meaning families of the Covenant School and Hale’s father could have pursued legal action against VUMC for its failure to report Hale’s suicidal and homicidal ideations to law enforcement
The attorney, Ed Yarbrough, told The Star, “Not able to comment.”
On Thursday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show, Pappert pointed out the significance of the attorney’s decision not to deny such an arrangement in his comment.
“I would just say, I’m not alleging anything, but if I were an attorney, I think what I would do is say, ‘Let’s avoid the newspapers. Let’s just make a settlement, do it out of court. Nobody will ever hear about it. We’ll make them sign something and say they can never talk about it again, and we’ll avoid a bunch of nasty articles from the conservative media about how we failed here and the transgender movement was let down by us.’ It could very well be this was their opportunity to do exactly that,” Pappert said.
“Again, I would say that Ed Yarbrough’s comment does not state that there is no such financial arrangement. He says he is not able to comment on whether there is such a financial arrangement. Normally when folks say no comment, they say no comment. ‘Not able to comment’ is almost a little bit odd to me,” Pappert added.
Leahy also theorized that VUMC wanted to “get ahead” of civil liability claims by making financial arrangements with the Covenant School families and Hale’s father.
“My working theory of the case is that in June of 2023, probably a dozen or so very smart attorneys working for Vanderbilt University Medical Center were well aware of the Tennessee statute that imposes one year of civil liability for the failure of medical health professionals at Vanderbilt University Medical Center to warn the father that his daughter said she wanted to kill him and that the daughter threatened a school shooting,” Leahy said.
“My theory of the case is that these very smart attorneys working for the very powerful and very wealthy Vanderbilt University Medical Center knew of the exposure, just one year statute of limitations which expired in theory In march of 2024, and said, ‘Let’s get ahead of this and let’s round up everybody who would possibly have a claim against us and let us present to them a big pile of money in return for a non disclosure agreement.’ That’s my working theory and my working theory is that the amount of money that has changed hands from Vanderbilt University Medical Center to the families of these six victims, the Covenant School, the Covenant Church, the Covenant Children’s Trust, and the parents of the killer, is probably somewhere between $100 million and $200 million dollars,” Leahy added.
Pappert pointed out that if VUMC was to have paid out as much as $100 million or $200 million to Covenant School entities behind closed doors, the medical institution would have “probably saved a ton of money” by avoiding civil liability claims.
“If this theory is what happened, Vanderbilt University Medical Center still probably saved a ton of money by continuing to keep the integrity and the reputation of both its transgender program and its psychiatric program,” Pappert said.
Watch the full interview:
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
