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There is a GoFundMe for the Wife of Murdered BDO Atlanta Managing Director Wesley Freeman

Wesley Freeman with his wife, Alicia.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported today that a GoFundMe campaign has been started for the family of Wesley Freeman, the BDO Atlanta managing director who was shot and killed by his former BDO colleague Raissa Kengne on Aug. 22.

Here is a Facebook post from Beth Lee Garner, national practice leader of employee benefit plan audits for BDO USA, who worked with Freeman for 15 years at the firm’s Atlanta office:

The GoFundMe, organized by family friend Chad McKinney, is for Freeman’s wife, Alicia, to raise funds for “everyday expenses and any additional hardships tied to unexpectedly losing a loved one.”

As of this posting, there have been 66 donations totaling $8,851. The goal of the campaign is $50,000.

Kengne, 34, an IT audit manager who worked under Freeman, 41, at BDO Atlanta from August 2019 until November 2021, shot and injured him at the firm’s offices at 1100 Peachtree St. NE in Midtown on Monday afternoon. Freeman was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital where he later died. Thirty minutes earlier, Kengne had fatally shot Michael Shinners, 60, the property manager at the condominium building at 1280 W. Peachtree St. NW where she resided. She also shot and injured Mike Horne, chief building engineer for Beacon Management Services, the company that manages the condos. He is recovering at the hospital.

A GoFundMe campaign has also been set up for the family of Michael Shinners, who was married with three children.

Freeman and Shinners were targeted by Kengne because the two men, as well as BDO USA, Beacon Management Services, and several other people, were named defendants in a whistleblower lawsuit filed by Kengne last May. The nearly 600-page lawsuit accused Freeman and BDO of retaliating against her for reporting violations of auditing standards pertaining to IT audit engagements, and Kengne accused Shinners and Beacon Management Services of allowing BDO to retaliate against her at her home.

The filing says Kengne faced “retaliation, persecution, harassment, intimidation, threats, burglary, computer hacking, phone spoofing, and other attacks” after “reporting to the relevant authorities a violation of the SEC regulations, PCAOB standards, the Antitrust law, and a circumvention of the law prohibiting employers from asking about an applicant’s pay history in the state of Georgia. The unlawful, criminal, immoral, and illegal acts presented in this instrument were perpetrated by the defendants.”

The case was moved to federal court in July, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Judge Catherine Salinas eventually ordered to strike Kengne’s original complaint from the docket, denied her motion to remand her case to state court, and denied her motion for a stay in all motions.

Last week, Kengne, who was representing herself, filed an appeal to Salinas’ order with the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, the newspaper reported.

After the shooting spree, Kengne was arrested and taken into custody by police at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport late Monday afternoon. She was charged with two counts of murder, four counts of aggravated assault, possession of a firearm, and false imprisonment.

Related article:

Ex-BDO IT Audit Manager Raissa Kengne Charged in Deadly Atlanta Shooting