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XPost: talk.politics.guns

The mother of a murdered 9-year-old Chicago boy is fighting back
against accusations that she used online donations meant for her
son’s burial to purchase a new car.

Karla Lee, 26, admitted using the money donated through GoFundMe
to buy the car, but said her son would have wanted her to be
safe and a car helps, Fox32 reported Saturday.

“Am I afraid for my life? 100 percent I’m afraid for my life,”
she told the station.

Following public outrage, Lee said she used her own money that
she had saved for months to make the purchase, according to the
station.

She also lashed out at her critics in an expletive-filled rant
on Instagram.

“This don’t make no sense,” she says in the 60-second video. “I
am so tired of ya’ll social media and ya’ll Facebook people
bashing me. Ya’ll don’t even know me. I was the best mother I
was to my son.”

Her son, Tyshawn Lee, was shot and killed Monday after being
lured into an alley on the city’s south side in what police say
was an “absolutely hateful” killing motivated by his father’s
alleged gang affiliations.

Early Sunday, a makeshift memorial for the boy in the alley was
destroyed in a fire, the Chicago Sun-Times reported, according
to Fox32.

Firefighters responded to a garage fire about 3 a.m., the
Chicago Fire Department said. The memorial, which included
several candles, was located next to the garage.

The fire department said the cause of the fire is under
investigation.

Lee purchased a 2015 Chrysler 200, WLS-TV reported Sunday. Lee
told the station she used her own money to make the down payment.

She told the station the trouble started when the dealership
where she bought the car posted her purchase on Facebook without
her knowledge. The post has been deleted.

More than $17,000 was raised in four days on a GoFundMe page
created by a friend of Lee’s to “help Karla lay her son to rest.”

The online fundraiser was closed Sunday morning, DNAChicago
reported.

In another bizarre twist, Tyshawn’s father apparently started
another GoFundMe page seeking donations for funeral expenses,
the website reported. The page was quickly taken down.

“I understand the mother of my son did wrong by that money, but
what the news is not telling, that they are only paying for half
the cost of everything," Wooh Gotti, an alias used by Tyshawn's
dad Pierre Stokes, wrote, according to DNA.”They are blaming us
so they don't have to pay the full cost of everything. She is in
the wrong for doing what she did with the money for our son,
just give me a chance to lay my son to rest the right way."

DNA reported that Stokes’ appeal sought $2,500 and the
fundraising page also was selling Tyshawn memorial T-shirts for
$25-$45.

A police spokesman told FoxNews.com Friday that Stokes
potentially knows who killed his son, but has refused to
cooperate with detectives.

A reward of $54,000 is being offered for information that leads
to the boy’s killer or killers.

Lee is hoping her son’s murder will be solved.

“Step up, break this code of silence or whatever ya'll got going
on with this gang stuff. Break that. Put the guns down,” she
told Fox 32. “Ya'll killing babies out here.”

Tyshawn's funeral is Tuesday.

https://fxn.ws/2JbDMq3
 

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