Olympic gymnast Simone Biles faces one of the hardest challenges of her personal life after her brother, Tevin Biles-Thomas, was arrested and charged on Friday stemming from a December 31 shooting which left three people dead.
Biles took to Twitter to share an emotional post, marking her first official statement on the news since her brother’s arrest made headlines.
“My heart aches for everyone involved, especially for the victims and their families,” she wrote. “There is nothing that I can say that will heal anyone’s pain, but I do want to express my sincere condolences to everyone affected by this terrible tragedy. I ask everyone to please respect my family’s privacy as we deal with our pain. XO,” she wrote in closing.
She captioned her note with, “still having a hard time processing last weeks news.”
Many of her followers replied with messages of support and encouragement.
Prior to her post on Monday Biles sent a series of cryptic tweets which showed the raw emotion and difficulties public figures face as they are merely human.
According to TMZ, Biles-Thomas was charged with murder, voluntary manslaughter, felonious assault and perjury from the New Year’s Eve shooting which occurred after a fight broke out at a party hosted in a Cleveland, Ohio, Airbnb rental.
Two people, Delvaunte Johnson, 19, Toshaun Banks, 21, died at the scene, while a third, Devaughn Gibson, 23, died at a nearby hospital, CNN reports.
Biles Thomas is scheduled to appear in court on September 13 and is currently behind held without bail as he awaits to extradition to Cuyahoga County.