A car crash in Ohio that killed two young men has become the subject of a new Netflix documentary, reigniting debate over whether the teenage driver acted deliberately or was the victim of a tragic accident.
What happened on July 31, 2022?
In the early morning hours of July 31, 2022, 17-year-old Mackenzie Shirilla was behind the wheel of a 2018 Toyota Camry in Strongsville, Ohio, with her boyfriend Dominic Russo, 20, and his friend Davion Flanagan, 19. The three had spent the night at a friend’s house and left around 5:30am. Minutes later, Shirilla’s car slammed into a brick wall at nearly 100 mph on a 35 mph road. Russo and Flanagan were pronounced dead at the scene. Shirilla was found unconscious and rushed to the hospital with serious injuries.
Investigators later found that the car’s accelerator was fully pressed with no brake applied in the 4.6 seconds before the crash. A forensic expert also concluded there was no mechanical or electrical failure that could have caused a loss of control. Shirilla was also found to be under the influence of marijuana and was carrying psychedelic mushrooms at the time, according to court documents cited by People.
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Did Mackenzie Shirilla crash the car on Purpose?
What was first treated as an accident soon became a criminal case. Prosecutors argued that Shirilla deliberately drove into the wall to kill Russo, citing their troubled relationship which has frequent fights, breakups and threats in the months before the crash. A family friend, Christopher Martin also said that he had heard Shirilla say, “I’m going to wreck this car right now,” during an argument with Russo just weeks before the fatal incident, according to court documents.
In August 2023, Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Nancy Margaret Russo found Shirilla guilty of all 12 charges against her, including murder, aggravated vehicular homicide, felonious assault and drug possession in a bench trial. Shirilla had chosen not to have a jury.
“She had a mission and she executed it with precision,” the judge said before handing down the verdict, per 3News. “The decision was death.”
She was sentenced to two concurrent 15-year-to-life terms and her driver’s license was permanently suspended.
At sentencing, a tearful Shirilla addressed the victims’ families directly: “To the families of Dom and Davion, I am so deeply sorry. I hope one day you can see how I’d never let this happen or do it on purpose. I wish I could remember what happened. I’m just so sorry. I’m heartbroken.”
Shirilla and her legal team have tried multiple appeals and all have been denied. The Ohio Supreme Court declined to review her case in April 2025 and then again in March 2026, according to WKYC.
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Where is Shirilla now and what is the Netflix documentary about?
Shirilla who is now 21, is currently incarcerated at the Ohio Reformatory for Women in Marysville and will not be eligible for parole until 2037, per the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.
Netflix’s new documentary The Crash, which began streaming on May 15, revisits the case and explores the competing narratives around it and focuses heavily on Shirilla’s relationship with Russo and new claims from her family. Her parents, Steve and Natalie Shirilla, allege that medical evidence pointing to Shirilla suffering a possible loss of consciousness before the crash was overlooked during the trial, according to Today.
“Show me one piece of evidence, one that says she did this on purpose,” Steve Shirilla told 3News in 2025. “There’s no evidence [of] what was going on in that car other than information they gleaned from the black box.”
Shirilla herself briefly speaks in the documentary: “It’s really hard everyday in here. I try to wake up and be the best person I can be everyday. There’s not a moment that doesn’t pass where I don’t think about [Russo and Flanagan].”