22-year-old Stephon Clark was shot and killed by Sacramento police on Sunday, after the police mistook Clark’s cell phone for a handgun while he was standing in his grandmother’s backyard.
According to The Sacramento Bee, New Orleans Pelicans center DeMarcus Cousins has “reached out to the family” and offered to pay for Clark’s funeral. Cousins — out for the season due to rupturing his Achilles — was a star with the Kings for six and a half seasons before being traded to the Pelicans during the 2016-17 season.
Former Kings All-Star center DeMarcus Cousins has reached out to the family of Stephon Clark to cover the cost of the funeral, a source told The Bee.
A GoFundMe page was set up by Clark’s family on Monday for funeral expenses, with a $50,000 goal. At the time of this post, $64,107 has been raised by 1,874 people.
As the money raised by that many people would indicate, the Sacramento community has had a huge response to Clark’s death.
On Thursday, demonstrators began protests at Sacramento City Hall, then proceeded to stop traffic on the freeway, and continued on to the Golden 1 Center where the Kings-Hawks game was being played. The protests caused the start of the Kings-Hawks game to be delayed 20 minutes, and the arena doors were locked resulting in only about 2,000 people being in attendance. And after the game, Kings owner Vivek Ranadivé addressed the crowd with a powerful message on the protests and Clark’s death.
The Sacramento Bee notes that this would not be the first time Cousins has paid for a funeral following a fatal shooting in Sacramento:
He paid for the funeral of Grant High School football player Jaulon “JJ” Clavo, who was shot before a playoff game in 2015. He held free basketball camps at Sacramento High School and bought a new scoreboard for the school’s basketball gym.
It’s really impressive to see Cousins remaining active in the Sacramento community and the offer to pay for Clark’s funeral is a tremendous gesture.
