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Kesha Luwan Lucille Tate is being remembered as someone who would give her friends “the shirt off her back,” neighbor Latosha McFadden told theAssociated Press.
Last month, the 42-year-old South Carolina mother of nine was killed when Nicholas Skylar Lucas, a neighbor allegedly known to engage in target shooting at objects on his lawn, shot her dead with a .45-caliber handgun.
Though originally charged with involuntary manslaughter, Lucas now faces charges of murder, use of a firearm under the influence and discharging a firearm into a dwelling after authorities said their investigation has discredited his claim that the bullet ricocheted off a satellite dish.
He has denied shooting Kesha intentionally, and said at his bond hearing that the shooting was a “complete accident,” according to the Associated Press.
It was not immediately clear if Lucas had a lawyer to comment on his behalf.
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“If that man got to know my sister he would’ve never killed her,” Denise Tate, Kesha’s sister, told the AP. “She would’ve gave him a place to stay, foot to eat, clothes, all of that. Anything he needed, even for his family, she would’ve helped.”
At the time of the shooting, Kesha was cooking dinner for her family and Lucas was shooting at backyard targets with his friends, per the AP. Kesha, from their backdoor, then asked her neighbor to stop firing the gun.
When she pulled back the curtain minutes later, her brother-in-law Terry Manning said her children said she was shot. AsWYFFreported, children as young as four years old were home at the time of the shooting.
“She always made sure I was taken care of. Even as an adult she was always there. She was my backbone,” Denise said of her sister. “So I gotta keep it together and stay strong for these kids and her grandson.”
James Pollard/AP/Shutterstock
“This is a senseless death that could have been avoided had the gun owner been responsible and chosen a safer place to target practice,” Cherokee County Sheriff Steve Mueller said, perWMBF. “It is mind-blowing that a person thinks it’s alright to target practice or discharge a gun within close proximity to so many other homes in a neighborhood.”
ames Pollard/AP/Shutterstock
In 2020, South Carolina was determined to have the ninth highest firearm mortality rate,per datafrom the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
source: people.com
