The 17-year-old Nashville school shooter, who killed a teenage girl at Antioch High School before taking his own life, reportedly left a disturbing trail of hateful online posts and was described as a “self-loathing incel” by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).
According to ADL representative Carla Hill, teen shooter Solomon Henderson shared a range of troubling views in a supposed 47-page manifesto and on social media before targeting 16-year-old Josselin Corea Escalante at Antioch High School on Wednesday. The supposed manifesto contained a detailed map of the Tennessee school, photographs of the weapons he planned to use, and his reflections and thoughts on why he wanted to carry out the shooting.
Inside the Killer’s Mind
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His last writings were dated November 18, the same day the Metro Nashville Police Department received a report of a school shooting at Antioch High School. However, authorities later confirmed the incident was a hoax, according to News Channel 5.
“I was so miserable. I wanted to kill myself. I just couldn’t take anymore. I am a worthless subhuman, a living, breathing disgrace,” the 17-year-old Henderson allegedly wrote.
“All my [in real life] friends outgrew me, act like they didn’t f***ing know me. Becoming me was so f***ing humiliating. That’s why I spend all day dissociating.”
A major portion of the document, reportedly tied to a social media account associated with Henderson, focuses on his struggles with race and racial identity.
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Henderson allegedly said that he felt “ashamed to be Black” and proceeded to use anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim language.
“The difference between good and bad criminals depends on how well they were dressed. It depends on what weapon they used. It depends on their posture, their voice, their plan of attack,” Henderson mused.
“It depends on how they carried it out. It depends on their height, their bone structure, their body fat percentage, their haircut. It depends on who their victim was.
“Even the very worst of criminal acts are forgiven by simply looking good. Or cool. Or interesting in some way,” he wrote, before listing his plans to get in better shape.
In a Q&A section of the document, Henderson said that he had no intention of harming law enforcement officers and did not view himself as a victim of bullying. “Personally in my life, I can’t remember a single instance of being bullied, at least not [conventionally],” the manifesto reads. “I was bullied in the culture sense, which everyone is bullied in.”
Planning the Attack
He then shared his views on Antioch High School, located just outside of Nashville, which predominantly serves Black and Hispanic students. “School is a daycare,” he wrote. “It’s impossible for you to actually think. You say things because other people have said it before, then go repeat ad nauseum somewhere else.
“In school, we’re taught to wake up early, shut up, sit for long periods of hours, do tasks you hate, then repeat.”
ADL representative Carla Hill told The New York Post on Wednesday night what might have been going on in Henderson’s mind before he carried out the attack. “What happens on the incel forums … is that people of color are told the only reason they’re incels is because of their color and so it pushes them toward other extreme ideology that he apparently took on,” Hill said.
“He picked up antisemitism, he posted a lot of anti-black content because of that … internalized racism,” said Hill, who is senior director of investigative research at the organization.
Henderson allegedly included links to other manifestos, as well as a guide on how to carry out a mass killing, with targets ranked by their perceived vulnerability. He also shared images of a handgun, a lockpicking kit, and ammunition intended for the firearm he planned to use in the shooting.
On Wednesday, the teen arrived at the school via bus, entered a bathroom, and is believed to have retrieved a weapon.
Around 11 a.m., wearing a hoodie, he “confronted” 16-year-old Josselin Corea Escalante and fired several shots with a pistol before turning the gun on himself.
The teen livestreamed the shooting and had posted on his X page that he had saved enough money to buy a GoPro camera, but struggled to explain the need for it to his parents, preventing him from making the purchase, according to Raw Story.
