Behind B@rs: New details reveal Mackenzie Shirilla...

A photo of Natalie Shirilla and Mackenzie Shirilla.Credit : Cuomo Crime Time C/Youtube; The Chris Cuomo Project/Youtube; Ohio Reformatory for Women

Mackenzie Shirilla is struggling to come to terms with life behind bars.

On Thursday, June 25, her mom Natalie Shirilla opened up on Chris Cuomo’s Crime Time podcast about her daughter’s mental state in prison, days after the Ohio Supreme Court declined to hear a second appeal of her case.

“It’s almost like she’s trapped in a nightmare that she has no memory of,” Natalie said about her daughter, who was convicted in 2023 of intentionally crashing her car into a brick building at 100 mph, killing passenger Davion Flanagan, 19, and her boyfriend Dominic Russo, 20.

During her trial, prosecutors argued she had a tumultuous relationship with Russo and that she crashed the car in order to end their romance.

Her attorneys — and her parents — have since argued in appeals that “there is medical evidence” that Shirilla may have “suffered from a pre-existing medical condition that could have caused her to black out while driving.”

“She’s never seen the evidence. She’s never seen the discovery. She’s never seen anything,” Natalie added to Cuomo.

“She’s almost trapped in a nightmare that she has. All she knows is that the boyfriend that she loved with her whole, whole heart is gone and Davion is gone and she was the driver in a car accident, and has no memory of it.”

Natalie added to Cuomo, 55, that her daughter has no recollection of what happened on the day of the crash and still questions what happened every day.

She also revealed that her daughter, who is serving two concurrent sentences of 15 years to life in prison at the Ohio Reformatory for Women for the incident, makes artwork to pass her time in prison.

“It’s so sad, and one of these days I’ll share it, but I’m not going to share it now for obvious reasons, but it’s really sad,” an emotional Natalie said about her daughter’s art.

“She does self-portraits of herself where she has… like a rose of thorns around her neck or like her mouth is sewn shut and she’s got all these question marks around her head like, ‘Why, why, why?’ ”

“And like, ‘Where’s Dom?’ Like, ‘What happened and [to] Davion?’ It’s like so sad she’s literally trapped in this nightmare, and so she struggles mentally with that part and I feel bad for everybody,” Natalie added.

Natalie’s comments come after Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Sharon Kennedy declined Mackenzie’s appeal in her case, which was the subject of the Netflix documentary The Crash. The Ohio Supreme Court originally declined to review her appeal in May 2025.

Mackenzie has attempted to appeal the case three times, twice in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court and once in the Eighth District Court of Appeals, all of which have been denied.

Mackenzie currently has an expected release date of October 29, 2037, per state prison records.