L.A. rapper The Game comes to financial aid of Asheville boy who was shot, left for dead

Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

1

The L.A. rap star The Game has used his social media presence on Instagram and also Twitter over the past couple of days to help raise money for an Asheville boy who was shot and left for dead in a north Asheville park earlier this year.

The Game, who has 6.7 million followers on Instagram and more than 1.1 million followers on Twitter, posted a photo of 3-year-old Zachaeus L. Waters and linked to a crowdfunding effort for the boy. The Game urged his followers to donate and recounted Zacheaus’ story: that both he and his mother were found shot at Jones Elementary School Park in May.

The boy’s pregnant mother, 23-year-old Candace Pickens, was found dead, while the boy was found clinging to life after being shot in the head. (Police later arrested and charged a 24-year-old man with several charges, including first-degree murder.) The boy lost an eye and his father has been out of work trying to help his son recover, The Game wrote.

“No child on earth should ever have to experience something so tragic especially at such a young age!!! I’m staring the donations off with $1,000 in hopes my fans will FOLLOW & DONATE ANYTHING AS SMALL AS $1” and help the boy and his father, Daquan Waters, The Game wrote in his Instagram post. “THEY REALLY NEED OUR HELP!!!”

On Tuesday afternoon, the GoFundMe page for Zachaeus’ Long Road to Recovery had more than $7,600 in donations.

WLOS reports that rapper Snoop Dogg has also used his social media presence to post links to the fundraiser for Zachaeus.