Anonymous donors give $3M for fund to honor slain Charleston pastor
CHARLESTON, S.C. -- A group of anonymous donors from outside South Carolina has given $3 million to start a fund for college scholarships for Charleston-area students following the slaying of nine people at a historic black church last month.
The victims were gunned down on June 17 at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. A white man has been charged with nine counts of murder and authorities are investigating the attack as a hate crime.
Mayor Joseph P. Riley Jr. announced in the sanctuary Friday that the scholarship fund is being named in honor of the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, the church's pastor who was killed in the shootings. Pinckney was a South Carolina state senator.
The announcement came the same day that the last shooting victim, the Rev. Daniel Simmons Sr., 74, was buried in Columbia.
The donors said in a statement read by Riley that they want to honor Pinckney, and want the members of the parish known as Mother Emanuel "to know that others, most of whom do not share their race or religion, who do not come from South Carolina, abhor the injustices which they have suffered."
Riley said the scholarships would go first to students related to the shooting victims, and will be available to both black and white students. He said he didn't know how many people gave the money or who they are.
"All I know is they are generous, loving Americans who wanted no credit but simply wanted to do their part," the mayor said.
The Rev. Dr. Norvell Goff, the church's interim pastor, called the donations "a tremendous opportunity to show the world once more again that goodness of heart overtakes evil."
Riley said that a total of about $4.8 million has now been donated to a scholarship fund and two other funds that were established following the shootings.
At Pinckney's funeral last week, the "Mother Emanuel" choir, hundreds strong, led roughly 6,000 people in a medley of spiritual standards.
"The nation shares in your grief," Mr. Obama said Friday during his eulogy for Pinckney. "What a good man. What an example he set."