North Carolina
A North Carolina woman dies after going on a Vodou retreat in Haiti. Her son wants answers.
“My mom went down to Haiti, they did this last piece of the ceremony, and something sinister happened,” said Timothy Jackson.
A North Carolina man is asking for answers after his mom died while on a Vodou retreat in Haiti.
Dana Jackson, 51, wanted to become a Manbo priestess. A Manbo priestess “is a female ritual specialist in the Haitian Vodou tradition. Like her male counterpart, the oungan (or houngan), she performs ceremonies, initiations, healings, and divinations,” according to an article on the Harvard University website.
Vodou is an African religion and comes from the word Fon which means “God” or “Spirit” and “originated in the ancient kingdom of Dahomey (present-day Nigeria, Benin, and Togo)”, according to an article on the religion by PBS.org. Alternative spellings of the religion include Vodun and Vodoun, but not Voodoo. The spelling Voodoo is considered “the sensationalist and derogatory Western creation,” the article continues.
Her son, Timothy Jackson, told USA TODAY that this was something that she wanted to do and had been practicing for a few years prior to her trip to Haiti.
“Four years ago, my mom started to do a little bit of research on the African traditional spiritual belief systems and Vodou was a part of that,” he said. “She had kind of been on this path of just kind of doing research and practicing, or at least, just doing her due diligence as far as research is concerned.”
Jackson said that his mom left for Haiti on July 1 and was supposed to return to the United States on July 26. His mom traveled with a group of people who had joined a house in order to participate in the Vodou rituals.
“The people that she went down there with, their name is Sosyete and I believe that that means society in the Turkish language and Nago,” Jackson said. “These weren’t strangers that she went down there with. These are people that she’s built a relationship with.”
Jackson said the group recently went on a trip to Boston together in June.
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No communication was apart of the Vodou ceremony
During part of the Vodou ceremony, Jackson expected to not hear from his mom.
“If you do any research about that part of the ceremony, even just on Google, it’ll tell you, that’s very sacred and things of that nature,” he said. “So she sent me one last message on the 13th, and she said, ‘we will talk on the 21st going to church tomorrow.‘”
Jackson and his mom spoke every day. The no communication part was nerve-wrecking to him, but he wanted to respect his mother’s decision to participate in the ritual. In the last message he received from his mom on July 21 she asked him to, “pray for her.”
“That whole entire week just kind of low key, (I was) having anxiety because I’m not able to hear from her, and I know that this is a very important part of the ceremony,” he said. “On the 21st, I didn’t hear anything from her. I did reach out to her at about 5 p.m. on WhatsApp. I didn’t get any response.”
Mom doesn’t respond after Vodou ceremony; son finds out about her death
The next day, Jackson still did not get a message from his mom, and he began to worry.
“I woke up. I’m not gonna lie, I was in a little bit of a panic, because I felt like by now, she at least would have responded to my text,” he said.
Around 5 p.m. on July 22, his grandmother broke the news that his mom had died.
“The way she told me was, ‘your mom’s not coming back from Haiti.’ So I hung up the phone with her,” he said “I called her back. I asked her, ‘what did she mean?’ She said, ‘she’s not coming back from Haiti. She passed away.’ I hung up the phone. I called her again.”
After a lot of back and forth between Jackson and his grandmother, he called his grandfather, and he confirmed that his mom had died.
‘Something sinister happened’
In order to confirm his mother’s passing, Jackson reached out to one of the leaders of the group that went to Haiti with his mom. The first thing they asked him was, “how much did he know?”
“To be completely honest with you, my initial thought was my mom went down to Haiti, they did this last piece of the ceremony, and something sinister happened,” he said.
The person that spoke with him told him that his mom had gotten extremely sick during the ceremony. They told him that she kind of fainted. When she regained consciousness, she didn’t know where she was. When a member of the house asked her where she was, she said in Virginia, Jackson said.
However, Jackson said his family hadn’t lived in Virginia in over a year.
Jackson said they also told him that they brought her to the hospital. At the hospital, she started to have seizures, and they said she had a heart attack and a stroke.
“That was the initial story,” he said. “They said that my mom didn’t bring her medicine. So there was a red flag, because what medicine are you guys talking about? it sounds like they were trying to perpetuate a story.”
Jackson also was supposed to get an update on where his mom’s body is located on Aug. 16 but that still hasn’t happened.
“I haven’t heard anything, he said. “I don’t even think the U.S. Embassy got involved, or even received the necessary paperwork until about four days ago.”
USA TODAY reached out to the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince, but they did not respond prior to publication.
Remembering Dana Jackson
Although Jackson’s mom had him at a young age, her goal was to work hard to create a better life for them.
In 1999, Jackson said that his mom took a job at a technology company that was based in Savannah, Georgia. In his mom’s role she was to help start the companies operations in the state. During their time in Georgia, Jackson remembers getting his own bathroom. bedroom, attending extracurricular activities and ultimately getting closer to his mom.
Years later he asked his mom why she decided to relocate.
“I asked her, many years later, ‘why did you decide to move down there?’ She said ‘Tim, I needed that time to learn how to become a mother to my son,’” he said.
Another memory that Jackson shared was in 2017 when his family took a trip to Las Vegas, Nevada where the two ended up meeting rapper Nelly. The rapper ended up turning around and talking to the two before he left the hotel, Jackson said.
“In Vegas, we were getting ready to check into our hotel, and Nelly was coming out. My mom looked at me, and I looked at her, and then we just both chased him,” he said. “That was just how in sync we were.”
GoFundMe created for Dana Jackson’s funeral costs
Jackson created a GoFundMe account for his mom’s funeral and additional costs that he will need in the future.
“(The GoFundMe was created for) funeral costs, any costs associated with bringing her body back,” he said. “I would like to do an autopsy. I’ve been quoted a price for that.”
His mom told him how she wanted her funeral to go.
“We had a conversation maybe six years ago where she told me she wanted to be cremated, and she told me what her last wishes were,” he said.
Dana Jackson was supposed to turn 52 on Sept. 13, Jackson said.
“We don’t know what happened in the last nine days, but whatever happened, my mom did not go to Haiti not to come back to the United States,” he said.
RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) — (AP/WNCN) — The remains of a U.S. Army soldier with ties to North Carolina who went missing during military exercises in Morocco a week ago have been recovered in the Atlantic Ocean, the U.S. military said Sunday. Military teams are still searching for a second missing soldier.
The remains found are those of 1st Lt. Kendrick Lamont Key Jr., a 14A Air Defense Artillery officer, who was one of two U.S. soldiers who fell off a cliff during a recreational hike in Morocco while off duty.
Key, 27, from Richmond, Virginia, was a graduate of Methodist University in Fayetteville.
The two were reported missing on May 2 after participating in African Lion, annual multinational military exercises held in Morocco.
Key earned a Bachelor of Science in marketing from Methodist University in Fayetteville, with minors in international business, entrepreneurship, and business administration.
“A Moroccan military search team found the Soldier in the water along the shoreline at approximately 8:55 a.m. local time May 9, within roughly one mile of where both Soldiers reportedly entered the ocean,” U.S Army Europe and Africa said in a statement.
The two went missing around 9 p.m. near the Cap Draa Training Area outside Tan-Tan, a terrain characterized by mountains, desert and semidesert plains, according to the Moroccan military.
Their disappearance triggered a search-and-rescue operation involving more than 600 personnel from the United States, Morocco and other military partners. The operation deployed frigates, vessels, helicopters and drones.
Search efforts will continue for the missing second soldier, a U.S. defense official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity as they were not allowed to speak publicly on the issue.
The official said a U.S. contingent remained in Morocco after the multinational war games ended Friday to provide command and control and to continue search and rescue operations.
Key was assigned to Charlie Battery, 5th Battalion, 4th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, 10th Army Air and Missile Defense Command, U.S Army Europe and Africa said.
He entered military service in 2023 as an officer candidate and earned his commission through Officer Candidate School in 2024 as an Air Defense Artillery officer. He later completed the Basic Officer Leader Course at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, according to the statement.
Key is survived by his father, Kendrick Key Sr.; his mother, Jihan Key; his sister, Dakota Debose-Hill; and his brother-in-law, U.S. Army Spc. James Brown.
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The search-and-rescue operation, now in its ninth day, has covered more than 12,000 square kilometers of sea and littoral zone, currently adding around 3,000 square kilometers per day.
The soldiers had been taking part in African Lion 26, a U.S.-led exercise launched in April across four countries – Morocco, Tunisia, Ghana and Senegal – with more than 7,000 personnel from over 30 nations. Since 2004, it has been the largest U.S. joint military exercise in Africa.
In 2012, two U.S. Marines were killed and two others injured during a helicopter crash in Morocco’s southern city of Agadir while taking part in the exercises.
North Carolina
NC State graduates stunned as donor pays off senior year debts in commencement speech
North Carolina State graduates were in for a surprise when their commencement speaker vowed to erase some of their student debt, offering the class “greater freedom” to pursue their goals.
Anil Kochhar, the son of a notable late NC State alumnus, revealed that he and his wife, Marilyn, would pay off all final-year loans for the graduates during the Wilson College of Textiles commencement ceremony in Raleigh on Friday.
“It is my privilege to announce today that, in honor of my father Prakash Chand Kochhar, Marilyn and I are providing a graduation gift to cover all the final-year education loans incurred by Wilson College graduates during the 2025–26 academic year,” Kochhar announced.
The emotional gift honored Kochhar’s late father, Prakash Chand Kochhar, who traveled from Punjab, India, to Raleigh in 1946 to study textile manufacturing at NC State.
The crowd erupted in cheers and gave the Kochhars a standing ovation as stunned students realized their senior-year loans were gone.
“Marilyn and I hope that all of you leave Reynolds Coliseum today not only with a degree but with greater freedom to pursue your goals, take risks and build the lives you’ve worked so hard to achieve,” Kochhar added.
The graduating class consisted of 176 students who received their bachelor’s degree and another 26 earned a master’s degree, according to Axios Raleigh,
For many students, the surprise payout could mean a dramatically different future.
“As a daughter of immigrants, this money helps me and my family a lot, and I’m really fortunate to have an opportunity like this,” Alyssa D’Costa, a fashion and textile management major, told the university.
Prakash Chand Kochhar arrived in Raleigh on a scholarship to attend the then School of Textiles, where he was believed to be only the second Indian student ever to enroll at the university.
He went on to earn bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the school and build a career that took him around the world before his unexpected death in 1985.
The Kochhar family has made several major donations to the college in recent years, including scholarships and funding for faculty and graduate programs — but Friday’s graduation surprise may have been their most memorable gift yet.
“My father could not have imagined this moment. Not just me standing here, but all of you sitting here,” Kochhar said.
“A new generation, shaped by a different world, but connected by the same spirit of possibility that brought him here decades ago. And that’s what today represents.”
“Eighty years ago, a young man traveled thousands of miles from India to Raleigh with little more than hope and determination,” he added.
“He could not have known where that journey would lead. He could not have imagined the life it would create, or that one day his son would stand here speaking to a graduating class at the very institution that welcomed him.”
University officials said the Kochhars coordinated with school leadership and the Office of Scholarships and Financial Aid to arrange the debt payoff before graduation.
“I could not be more grateful to Anil and Marilyn for this extraordinary investment in our newest Wilson for Life alumni,” Wilson College of Texiles Dean David Hinks said.
“One of our primary goals is to make the Wilson College affordable for all, and Anil and Marilyn are helping us achieve it,” Hinks said.
HAMPTON, Tenn. (WVLT) – The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency said its wardens are investigating the eighth boating death of the year following an incident on Watauga Lake.
At around 7 p.m. on Friday, the TWRA was dispatched to a boating incident at Rat Branch boat ramp after the caller said the operator had fallen overboard in the no-wake zone and did not resurface.
The victim, identified as 36-year-old Alexander Luster, of Boone, North Carolina, was participating in a bass tournament and fell overboard prior to the start of the event, TWRA officials said. First responders recovered his body shortly after 11:30 p.m.
TWRA said an autopsy has been ordered, and the incident, which is the eighth boating death in Tennessee this year, remains under investigation.
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