Colleagues who launched a fundraising appeal to raise money to replace a care worker’s car that was destroyed during the riots say they have received threats and hateful messages.
A Gofundme page was set up by Redcar company Clare’s Care Ltd who hoped to raise £3,000 to replace Brendan Nwabichie’s car which was torched during the riots in Middlesbrough on August 3.
Mr Nwabichie was heartbroken after finishing a 12-hour care shift for the elderly to discover his car had been flipped upside down and set on fire near his home.
The appeal gathered huge traction with more than £63,000 raised.
But false rumours started circulating that Brendan was only going to get only £3,000 of the money, Teeside Live reported.
It was then that organisers say they started to receive hundreds of emails, messages and phone calls full of hate, and accusations they were “stealing” the cash, the news site said.
They claim to have been called racists, frauds, thieves, w****s and there were threats to destroy the business, with one saying “hope you get everything that’s coming to you”, Teeside Live reported.
A Clares’ Care spokesperson said: “There was a fake news posts published saying we were only giving him £3k and since then we have received so much hate - receiving hate for trying to help people out is ludicrous.”
They added: “Something that restored our faith in humanity has destroyed it again as our company is being tarnished for doing a good deed. We are heartbroken this has happened when we are a small family-run business that started with nothing.”
In an update on Sunday on the Go Fund Me page, the organisers said: “We always intended to fund Brendan’s new car along with additional expenses and stated that anything further would go to help our staff and local charities/organisations in the area helping those that were affected by the riots.”
It outlined, in agreement with Mr Nwabichie, that he would receive £28,000 to cover the cost of his new car and insurance, the company’s staff who were affected by the rioting would receive £1000, and local charities would receive £36,000 from the funding. It said anyone who was unhappy could request a refund of their donation from Gofundme.
In a further update on Monday, the organisers wrote: “With the support from GoFundMe we have managed to make Brendan the sole beneficiary for this GoFundMe page. Therefore he will receive the full amount and directly manage the funds moving forward.”
Mr Nwabichie declined to comment when approached by Teeside Live.
