Shaquille O'Neal reportedly donated $50,000 made during a DJ gig in Buffalo to the family of a victim killed in the mass shooting at a local grocery store last month.

Sources told TMZ Sports that O'Neal met with the widow and son of Aaron Salter Jr., a retired police officer fatally shot on May 14 while attempting to stop the gunman inside Tops supermarket from killing more people, prior to his show on Friday (June 26) night and agreed to give his gig compensation to the family.

The Buffalo mass shooting resulted in 10 deaths and three injuries.

Payton Gendron, 18, was arraigned on one count of murder in the first degree on Saturday night, the Erie County District Attorney's Office confirmed via NBC News.

A manifesto PDF that included a hared birthdate and biographical details with Gendron posted to Google Docs laid out specific plans to target Black victims and cited the "Great Replacement" Theory for motivation.

The "Great Replacement" Theory is the false ideology that a secret faction is attempting to replace white Americans with non-white individuals through immigration, interracial marriage and violence.

The manifesto was shared to Google Docs on Thursday (May 12) at 8:55 p.m., two days prior to the shooting at the Tops supermarket on Saturday and hadn't been modified since it was initially shared.

Police confirmed 11 of the 13 victims shot during the incident were Black.

O'Neal has made numerous generous donations in the past, having paid off a stranger's engagement ring in April 2021; filling the gap for a Lafayette, Louisiana high school that fell $19,000 short of its goal to finance a new weight room in 2018; paying for the funeral services of a 7-year-old Houston girl killed in a drive-by shooting in 2019 and a 13-year-old Forest Park boy who accidentally shot himself in 2017; paying the bill for a family's new home, which included furniture and televisions, when a 12-year-old Atlanta shooting victim was paralyzed and couldn't leave the hospital because he previous home wasn't equipped for him; and -- alongside fellow Hall of Fame center Dikembe Mutombo -- purchasing clothes for a 6-foot-11, 275-pound homeless man when news got out that he was struggling to find shoes and clothing.

The Buffalo Bills Foundation and the NFL Foundation also combined to donate $400,000 ($200,000 each) to the Buffalo Together Community Response Fund, which was set up in response to the shooting last in an effort to build upon "our collective desire to take action and to work to address immediate needs in our community, long-term community rebuilding, and systemic issues that have marginalized communities of color."

Mike McConnell

Check Out This Document