A TikTok star has been arrested after allegedly hitting and killing a pedestrian while livestreaming and driving through a Chicago suburb.
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According to TMZ, Tea Tyme, whose real name is Tynesha McCarty-Wroten, was arrested Tuesday in Zion, Illinois. She faces two felony charges: reckless homicide and aggravated use of communication resulting in death.
Police say McCarty-Wroten was livestreaming while driving in a Chicago suburb on November 3 when she hit 59-year-old Darren Lucas as he was crossing an intersection.
Chris King, Lucas’s son-in-law, said Tuesday that the state attorney’s office informed his family of McCarty-Wroten’s arrest.
“The family and myself are glad to see the wheels of justice moving,” King said, per The Guardian.
TikTok Personality Allegedly Said ‘I Just Hit Somebody’ on Livestream
Lucas was walking at an intersection in Zion, near his hometown of Beach Park, when a motorist reportedly struck him and left him unconscious. He was later pronounced dead at a hospital emergency room from blunt force injuries.
McCarty-Wroten stayed at the crash site to speak with investigators and was not immediately charged. However, the 43-year-old came under scrutiny after police discovered a video suggesting Lucas had been struck by a driver livestreaming on a TikTok account linked to Wroten at the time.
According to TMZ, the video was a screen recording of a TikTok livestream. It showed the user “Tea_Tyme_3” on the phone before a loud thud, after which she said: “F—, f—, f— … I just hit somebody.”
The TikTok user ended the livestream just as a child in the car asked what had happened. Meanwhile, another passenger asked if the driver was okay.
The account was later made private, and the bio, which stated the user was from Zion, was deleted.
TikTok prohibits users from livestreaming while driving. However, according to TMZ, many have found a workaround by using custom green screen backgrounds.
TikTok Personality Allegedly Asked For Donations For ‘Mental Leave’
Meanwhile, McCarty-Wroten faced backlash after hosting a livestream days after Lucas’s death, asking for Cash App donations to fund her “mental leave” from the internet.
Lucas’s family also launched a GoFundMe campaign to provide financial support for his widow. As of this writing, it has raised $2,770.