Fontella Marie Holmes, the single mother who won $188 million in the Brunswick County (NC) Powerball Lottery, paid $6 million to bail her drug dealer boyfriend out of jail again.
Holmes, 26, became a minor overnight celebrity when she went to pick up her big check, wearing a wool beanie and a smile as wide as Texas.
At the time Holmes said she would use her windfall to travel and make a better life for her children.
“I don’t have to worry about depending on nobody, I can do it all by myself. I can go back to school and make an even better life for my kids,” Holmes said in February after winning the $188 million jackpot.
But as soon as she received $127 million in one lump sum payment, Holmes paid $300,000 — 10% of her live-in boyfriend Lamar McDow’s $3 million bond — to spring him out of jail.
Then last month, the Shallotte, North Carolina native was arrested for marijuana possession. Her gang-affiliated drug dealer boyfriend was also arrested on an outstanding weapons charge.
A judge was so irked that a violent gang member was out on the streets that he raised McDow’s bond to $6 million cash.
But Holmes promptly paid the $6 million to bond McDow out of jail again.
Also arrested in the drug bust at Holmes’ house were Damarius Simmons, 21 and Danell McNeil, 31, who police say lived at the house with Holmes, McDow and Holmes’s children.
McDow was arrested last November on numerous drug charges in connection with a drug seizure last summer of 8,000 bags of heroin.
Many criticized Holmes for bailing a known gang banger and drug dealer out of jail twice.
“Where was this boyfriend when you were without, living in a trailer with your kids, mother, and uncle? Did he do for you and your kids?,” asked one commenter on Starnewsonline.com.
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