Hypn0sis Claim: What Mackenzie Shirilla texted her...

Dominic Russo and Mackenzie Shirilla; The crash scene.Credit : Courtesy of Netflix; Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office

After surviving a high-speed crash that killed her boyfriend and a friend, Mackenzie Shirilla told police and others that she could not remember what happened.

Shirilla, who was 17 at the time, was driving her boyfriend, 20-year-old Dominic Russo, and their friend, 19-year-old Davion Flanagan, home from a gathering with friends around 5:30 a.m. on July 31, 2022 when her Toyota Camry crashed into a brick wall in Strongsville, Ohio, at around 100 mph. Russo and Flanagan died at the scene.

At first, authorities treated the crash as an accident. But prosecutors later argued that it was a failed murder-suicide attempt tied to what they described as a toxic, on-and-off relationship between Shirilla and Russo, who had dated for four years.

Four months after the crash, Shirilla was arrested. In August 2023, she was convicted of murder, aggravated vehicular homicide and several other offenses.

According to a 2024 Ohio Court of Appeals opinion upholding Shirilla’s conviction obtained by PEOPLE, Shirilla texted Russo’s mother, Christine Russo, sometime after the fatal crash, saying she still had no memory of the incident and was even considering hypnosis to try to recover her memories.

“I remember turning onto the street, and then my vision fades to black,” Shirilla wrote. “It really kills me not to be able to remember anything. I promise you I would tell you. I’ve been asking my therapist why I don’t remember, and she said it’s because of trauma. I’m gonna try to get myself hypnotized and make myself remember,” per the opinion.

The opinion also states that Christine told investigators the relationship between her son and Shirilla had become strained in the six months leading up to the crash, citing frequent arguments and claiming Shirilla had become more “possessive” of Dominic.

Additionally, a friend of the Russo family testified that in the weeks before the crash, he witnessed Shirilla threaten to crash her car with Dominic inside, per the opinion. Shirilla’s parents, Natalie and Steve Shirilla, have since disputed this claim in the recent Netflix documentary The Crash, saying texts from Shirilla to Christine show Dominic was actually the one who made the alleged threat.

Shirilla has claimed she passed out while behind the wheel due to postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), a chronic medical condition that causes fainting and dizziness. However, no medical records or expert testimony confirming such a diagnosis were presented at her bench trial.

Prosecutors also cited car data showing the gas pedal was floored and the brakes were never used in the five seconds leading up to the crash. They further pointed to gear changes and steering movements made just before impact. Surveillance footage, they added, showed Shirilla driving normally on the residential road before suddenly speeding up. Testing also confirmed that the car did not experience any mechanical failure.

Shirilla, now 21, is incarcerated at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville and will become eligible for parole after serving 15 years.