CLEVELAND, Ohio – The family of one of the young men killed when Mackenzie Shirilla deliberately plowed her car into a brick wall is fighting to ensure the convicted double murderer never profits from the crime that destroyed their lives.
Christine Russo said her family has been “ruined” since Shirilla, then 17, killed her brother, Dominic Russo, 20, and their friend, Davion Flanagan, 19, in the horrific July 2022 crash.
“He just had nothing to do [Shirilla]“but obviously not for us in our family,” a tearful Russo, 37, told The Post from her parents’ home, about 6.5 miles from the fatal location. “We are really, really bad.”
With renewed interest in the case, sparked by Netflix’s new #1 documentary ‘The Crash,’ Russo and her family have petition calling on Ohio lawmakers to strengthen the state’s Son of Sam law.
The law was originally enacted after public outcry over convicted serial killer David Berkowitz who posed to profit from his crimes from book and movie deals in the 1990s.
Russo wants to see the Buckeye State statute modernized for the social media age, expanding beyond traditional media to include online influence, including Instagram followers, sponsorships, brand deals and other Internet-driven opportunities.
“This is all she ever wanted was attention,” Russo said of Shirilla, who posted regularly on social media and dreamed of becoming a model before ending up behind bars.
Shortly after her arrest, the “Hell on Wheels” killer and her mother, Natalie Shirilla, were heard on a recorded prison call cackling about the global attention surrounding her double murder case — and gleefully predicting that A-listers would soon come calling.
Former inmates at the Ohio Women’s Reformatory, where Shirilla has served two concurrent terms of 15 years to life since August 2023, told The Post that she showed no remorse behind bars.
Instead, she treated the lockup like a “popularity contest,” dancing around like the queen bee from “Mean Girls” and regularly taking selfies with her prison-issued tablet.
“Within hours (not days) of killing two young men, she’s on her phone [taking] taking selfies, shooting TikToks and trying to get modeling jobs,” Russo claimed. “That’s all she ever cared about.”
With the Netflix film putting the case back in the spotlight, Russo fears Shirilla could finally get exactly what she always wanted.
“With this movie, I just know how, if she ever gets out… how easy it will be for her to become Instagram famous, or, you know, whatever she always wanted,” she explained.
Russo also worries that existing laws leave room for financial benefits for Shirilla’s embattled parents.
“There are no laws stopping her family from taking advantage of this and then sending her the money,” Russo said. “So we are also exploring certain loopholes.”
The online petition, titled “Dom’s Law: Victims Before Influencers,” has collected more than 145,000 signatures.
Ohio lawmakers have already taken steps to expand the law legislation in 2025 that would expand the law to include online fundraising through sites like GoFundMe.
Russo described Shirilla as a “spoiled, rotten, dirty person” and said she would be “afraid of society” if she were ever released from prison. Shirilla is currently appealing her conviction for the second time.
The grieving sister also blamed Shirilla’s parents, Natalie and Steve, for their seemingly permissive approach to parenting, as well as their daughter’s crimes.
“I think they need to be reminded that we’re the victims here and they’re not, you know what I mean?” Russo said.
“Some people are just born narcissistic and self-centered… and then mixed with the way they were raised and never held accountable.
“She was a monster.”
Her criticism echoed that of Shirilla’s former girlfriend Jayna Mainard, who previously told The Post that Natalie and Steve were more concerned with gaining their daughter’s approval than raising her right.
“From what I see, they didn’t really care about her. They wanted her approval more than anything,” says Maynard, who met Mackenzie in high school.
“Kenzie runs the show – she runs her parents,” the 21-year-old added. “They shouldn’t have been her friend. They should have been her parents.”
Russo also ripped Shirilla’s claim in the Netflix doc that she and Dominic would have been married by now if the deadly crash had never happened.
“No, honey, you’ve only been here a few years…you’re delusional,” Russo said. “They wouldn’t have been together.”
Life without Dominic, she added, felt like “a nightmare.”
