Snoop Dogg has given a 93-year-old woman $10,000 (£7,800) to help her protect her family’s land.
A great-grandmother from South Carolina named Josephine Wright started a GoFundMe effort to try to get money to help her fight against land developers in court. Since the Civil War, her family has lived in the house on Hilton Head Island.
The 93-year-old woman was sued by a group called Bailey Point Investment LLC, which said that a few buildings on her land were actually on their land. The business group wants to build 147 new homes where Josephine lives, on Hilton Head Island.
Bailey Point Investment LLC is said to have offered to buy Josephine’s land for $30,000 (£23,400), but she turned them down. Since then, she has filed a lawsuit against the building group, accusing them of “harassing and intimidating” her.
Snoop Dogg told CNN why he chose to help in a statement. “I did it because I wanted to. He said, “She reminds me of both my mother and grandmother.”
According to the article, Josephine filed her countersuit because she thought that Bailey Point Investment LLC was using “a constant barrage of tactics of intimidation, harassment, trespass, and now this litigation, to try to force her to sell her property.”
Josephine’s story has touched a lot of well-known people, not just Snoop Dogg. Tyler Perry, who makes movies, has spoken out in favor of the great-grandmother.
The 53-year-old billionaire went on Instagram to talk about what was going on. Josephine Wright, who is 93 years old, told Tyler, “I’ve pretty much been a fighter my whole life.” So now there are two of us. Please tell me where to go and what I need to help me fight, Ms. Wright.”
Podcast host and writer Whitney Alese also used Twitter to bring attention to Josephine’s position. She said that the woman’s family has owned the land “since the end of slavery” and that the home has “generations of family history.”
Whitney also said that the house has been a place for her “seven children, 40 grandchildren, 50 great-grandchildren, and 16 great-great-grandchildren to” get together for more than 30 years.
So far, Josephine and her family have raised $279,217 (£218,127) of their goal of $350,000 (£270,000).
Josephine has called the court case “frivolous” when talking about it. She told WSAV-TV that the town gave the business company permission to build on 29 acres of land behind her house.
The investment company then offered to buy her land, but she said no. This is what started the case, so that Bailey Point can buy her land.
Josephine also said that her family has owned the property and the land around it since 1861, when the Civil War started.