Jeremy's alleged "To whoever I decide this is to" suicide letter: is it real or not?

Originally posted on Tumblr on November 5, 2023.

[Quoting Morbidology's Tumblr post]


Jeremy Delle was a 15-year-old sophomore who had just recently transferred to a new school [...].

One of his suicide notes:

“To whoever I decide this is to, I have a lot going on, a little too much more than what I can handle I’m in too much pain, and I just want YOU to understand why I’m doing this, I don’t hate myself I hate what’s going on in my life my parents, a new school I feel like I don’t fit in nowhere. I realize that there will be friends that will try to ask me why because I feel like I have to, I feel it’s the only way. I rather end my own life than others and that’s what its gonna come down to so I’m taking the shame out of myself. Thanks to the only people that was ever good to me, the people that was there for me. I figure it’s been so many ya’ll wont even know I’m gone and as for ones that tried to hurt me you didn’t. I know Barnett is gonna ask me to go get a pass but I ain’t getting that damn pass I’m getting the gun and the next time you see me I’m going to blow my fucking brains out. I want my blood to shed on everybody, I want everybody to feel my pain and seeing me die will make them in pain. To my dad shit what kind of shit is that, and my mom, I’m not going to waste my breath well goodbye see all in better days” 

As a reply to Morbidology, I wrote this and the following article: 

@morbidology likes to share this heartbreaking alleged suicide note of Jeremy every now and then, and judging by the amount of people who reblog it or like it, it is believed to be true.

But is it? And where does it come from? 

THE ORIGIN OF THIS LETTER

Morbidlogy most likely got part of the letter and its sources from the section 'Aftermath' on jeremywadedelle.com. Here, Ash linked a 2009 post which is supposed to be the original source of the letter.

So according to this post, someone named Olivia said that they are "the so called boy in this story that was sitting infront of him that morning", that they "didn't read it until after the incident", that they "don't have that letter anymore" and that they "wrote a copy of it before investigators took it from them".

Before debunking or supporting their claims, let's historically retrace the events surrounding Jeremy's act.

WHAT WENT DOWN THAT DAY

Before class, at about 8.30 am, Jeremy went to Eagle's Nest and handed the envelope cointaining the ring and the suicide letter addressed to Nancy to his math classmate Andy Z. (thejeremystory). This event was reported in the article "Richardson teen-ager kills himself in front of classmates": "Sgt. Pennington said Jeremy apparently had given some thought to his actions because he left a suicide note with a classmate. Investigators would not disclose its contents." (ssheps) However, these contents were indeed disclosed in the 1991 police report which, being a legal and official document, has to include and mention anything that was discovered during the investigations. In fact, this is all the police report said about the contents of the letter which was given to Andy Z.:

Moving on. At past 9:20 Jeremy came to class and did what he did. The reactions of his classmates and teacher, according to the article "Richardson teen-ager kills himself in front of classmates" (ssheps), were these: "It stunned students and faculty members throughout the school at 1250 W. Belt Line Road."; ""But then I heard a scream and a blond girl came running out of the classroom and she was crying. [...] The teacher was standing against the wall crying and shaking," [...]"; "Students and counselors agreed that the shock of Jeremy's public demise would have a lingering effect on the Richardson students, particularly the witnesses. "They are going to go through a ton of sadness, anxiety and fear," said Sheryl Pender, a counselor with Willow Park Hospital in Plano and former director of the Suicide and Crisis Center in Dallas."

So this was the emotional reaction of the people who witnessed the fact.

Now, two things happened after the fact. From "The Interview - Interview with RHS Employee Regarding Jeremy" (ssheps): "A little while later a student named Eris came into the office with an emergency pass. He was not in her room but was passing by and heard the gunshot. He looked into the room and Mrs. Barnett was frozen. The student ran to the desk, got the emergency pass, lined up the students and Mrs. Barnett, and took them to the auditorium. He took control of the situation and brought the emergency pass to the office of Jerry Bishop, the principal. Mr. Bishop came running out [...]". And from "Richardson teen-ager kills himself in front of classmates" (ssheps): "The classmates who witnessed the shooting were immediately ushered to a secluded room for counseling."

So, in short: everyone was in shock, they were immediately removed from the classroom and received counseling shortly after. According to the report, the police received only one suicide letter handed by someone in the school, this someone being Andy.

FACT-CHECKING THE LETTER AND OLIVIA'S CLAIMS

Olivia said that they were "the so called boy in this story that was sitting infront of him that morning". They were referring to this piece from the article "Crisis teams respond quickly to teen’s suicide" (ssheps): "[...] To his surprise, the room was not filled with hysteria. “It was catatonic. No emotion,” he said. Danny, 17, talked with one boy who had seen the shooting from the front row of the classroom. "He couldn’t tell me how he felt,” he said. “He just kept telling me in detail what happened. Over and over.”"

1) Why would Danny say the person he talked to was a "boy" and not a girl, as Olivia claims? Being transgender and taking hormones was not a thing people did openly in 1990 Texas, a state which legalized homosexuality only in 2003. So it couldn't have been an MtF kid.

Given the person was in Jeremy's class, they must have been around 14-15 years of age. That's the age where kids are generally in the middle of puberty and physical differences between boys and girls become evident, and especially by hearing someone's voice, you can tell whether you're talking to a boy or a girl. So it is unlikely that Danny mistook Olivia for a boy when, according to Olivia, they weren't.

But what if Olivia changed their gender later on and went from being a "boy" to a "girl"? You'd think they would at least say something about it in their internet post, wouldn't they? You know, just to clarify the "so called boy" comment. To me that part just sounded like they really wanted to be at the center of the attention so they pretended they were the person the article talked about and that the article just got their gender wrong.

Something already smells fishy here.

2) Olivia claimed that they "didn't have that letter anymore", which doesn't surprise me: of course you didn't! Because otherwise people would have asked you to prove it by posting pictures and you knew you didn't have anything to back up your statement (since you made it all up), so instead you just said you "didn't have it anymore".

3) But then they said they "didn't read it until after the incident", while also saying that they "wrote a copy of it before investigators took it from them".

Let me unpack this because this is where I really call bullshit on all of this.

So you are the supposed boy, fifteen years old, brain still developing and with trouble regulating emotions, which means you are biologically more susceptible to traumas and whatnot; you are in the front row witnessing the violent suicide of a kid your age. A girl runs out of the classroom screaming, your classmates scream too, your teacher is crying. Erin comes into the classroom shortly after, gathers you all up and takes you all into the auditorium.

Now this could be the moment, after the incident, in which you could write down a copy of the supposed suicide letter Jeremy gave to you... when, exactly? Well, before the event took place. Well then, my question is: how are you going to do that? Did you take pen and paper with you as you were being rushed out the class? Why would you do that?

Also, did you find the time to copy that shortly before they took you and all of your classmates away for emergency counseling? And in which mental state were you able to do it, might I ask? Because everyone around you is either catatonic or crying and you claim you were the front row kid who, according to Danny, wasn't even able to say how they were feeling and that only kept repeating what happened over and over again.

I can really picture you there, being surrounded by traumatized people and being traumatized yourself, not even being able to tell how you were feeling; however thinking for whatever reason that your priority is not only reading the suicide letter (and not tell anyone around you about it), but grabbing pen and paper you had with you for some reason and making a copy of this suicide letter!

Who in their right mind would think: "I just witnessed something horrible. Let me write down a copy of this suicide letter before investigators come and take it from me". Are you a psychopath, Olivia? Because you definitely sound like one. Also, why would you make a copy when you could just keep the original? And why would you want to keep it, anyway?

And if you have a written copy of this letter, then why would you not post a picture of it, instead of typing down a poorly written copy of it for one internet post and then disappearing from the internet forever?

Also, if your name is Olivia and you were really there, then why can't I see your name on the list of the students which were in the classroom/were witnesses that day, mentioned in the 1991 police report? 

Is yours a pseudonym? Are you actually transgender and that's your new name? How can you post "facts" and claim you are real if you're not even gonna post your real name, or the name you had back then?

So yeah... sorry Olivia, and sorry @morbidology: that suicide letter you mentioned is most certainly false, and you are spreading falso info around only for clout.

Waterfall