Netflix’s new documentary The Crash has shot to the No 1 spot on the platform since its release, showing convicted killer Mackenzie Shirilla as a remorseful, subdued inmate who insists she is “not a monster.” But, a woman who actually shared prison space with Shirilla says the show tells a very different story from what she witnessed firsthand.
What a former inmate says she really saw
Mary Katherine Crowder, who is 27, has spent more than six months at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in 2024 alongside Shirilla and told the New York Post that watching the documentary left her stunned.
“When she walked out in the documentary, my jaw literally dropped, because her demeanor and the way that she looked was nothing like the person I was in there with,” Crowder told The Post.
According to Crowder, Shirilla who is now 21 has carried herself like a celebrity inside prison, keeping her hair and makeup done every day and even having her clothes altered to fit her better. Far from grieving, she reportedly bounced around the prison yard with a close group of young inmates.
“Everyone knew why she was there, and she walked around like she was this famous person within prison,” Crowder said. “She definitely carried herself like she was the Regina George of prison… she was very much like an ‘It girl.’” Crowder was referring to the leader of the famous Mean Girls movie clique.
Explosive claims about Mackenzie Shirilla’s prison life
Crowder also claimed that Shirilla was in multiple romantic relationships with other female inmates during her time there and had even been sent to solitary confinement for it.
“Yes, Mackenzie has had multiple girlfriends… she was walking around with hickies on her neck,” Crowder said. “She’s gone to ‘the hole’ [solitary confinement] for being intimate with girls in prison. If she was grieving or remorseful, she would not have gone to prison and jumped into prison relationships over the next six months.”
Shirilla’s comfortable prison lifestyle was allegedly funded by her parents and strangers she connected with through an online “prison sugar daddy” website.
“Mackenzie has makeup and jewelry in prison because her mom is ordering it for her… she was funding her prison lifestyle and making it as comfortable as possible,” Crowder said in a TikTok clip, as per The Post. “Also, Mackenzie is on the… prison sugar daddy website, so there’s sugar daddies, like, supplying her needs.”
Also Read: Who are Mackenzie Shirilla’s parents Steve and Natalie? Inside the Ohio woman’s family
Crowder also challenged health claims raised in the documentary saying that she never once saw Shirilla seek medical attention or show any signs of illness behind bars, despite her family’s claims that a possible loss of consciousness before the crash was overlooked.
“Never one time did I ever see Mackenzie Shirilla go for a blood pressure check, take any type of medication or go to sick call, ever experience dizziness. In fact, Mackenzie Shirilla would go out in 100-degree heatwaves with baby oil on her and sit in the prison yard and tan… the girl does not have any medical issues,” Crowder claimed.
Perhaps most strikingly, Crowder said Shirilla’s account of the crash itself was different inside prison from what was presented at trial.
“Mackenzie’s story when I was in prison with her was that she was high on shrooms when this accident occurred,” Crowder said, a claim that contradicts blood test evidence from the night of the crash, which only showed THC in Shirilla’s system according to court records.
Crowder’s TikTok videos about her time with Shirilla have also gone massively viral. She blasted the Netflix documentary for “trying to portray her as this innocent, well-behaved suburban girl. That’s not what she’s ever been or who she’s ever been.”
What happened and where is Shirilla now?
On July 31, 2022, 17-year-old Mackenzie Shirilla crashed her car into a brick wall at nearly 100 mph in Strongsville in Ohio which killed her boyfriend Dominic Russo who was 20 and his friend Davion Flanagan who was 19. Investigators found the accelerator was fully pressed with no braking in the final seconds and experts ruled out any car malfunction, according to court documents cited by People.
Prosecutors argued it was deliberate, pointing to the couple’s troubled relationship. A family friend testified he had heard Shirilla say, “I’m going to wreck this car right now,” weeks before the crash, per court documents.
In August 2023, Judge Nancy Margaret Russo found her guilty on all 12 charges. “She had a mission and she executed it with precision,” the judge said, per 3News. “The decision was death.” She was sentenced to two concurrent 15-year-to-life terms. All appeals have since been denied, according to WKYC and she will not be eligible for parole until 2037.
Shirilla is currently at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville, Ohio. She was charged with 4 counts of murder, 4 counts of felonious assault, 2 counts of aggravated vehicular homicide, 1 count of drug possession (psilocybin mushrooms), and 1 count of possessing criminal tools.
Netflix’s The Crash, streaming since May 15, revisits the case. Her father Steve Shirilla told 3News: “Show me one piece of evidence, one that says she did this on purpose. There’s no evidence [of] what was going on in that car other than information they gleaned from the black box.”
