A Lafayette family is appealing for help during a tragic time. Nicole Murphy (left) was struck and killed by a car this week while in South Africa. A former soccer standout at Saint Thomas More Catholic High School in Lafayette, she travelled to the country for the World Cup along with her brother, two of her sisters and her dad. Nicole and two of her siblings were hit by the car, her 19 year old brother is hospitalized in South Africa with a critical head injury.

Not on the trip were Nicole and Brian's older brother and sister, Lucas and Lauren and their mom Charlene.

"We're not ok, my mom's not ok, we're strong for her," said Lauren Murphy.

The challenge right now isn't just getting Nicole's body home, it's getting the family home together; since Brian is hospitalized the family will require a special medical plane.

"Once he's stable enough, we just found out that insurance isn't going to cover any of these costs to get them back home, an ICU med jet is going to be in excess of hundreds of thousands to get my family back," Lauren said.

The ICU medical jet will cost more than $300,000 and to help with those costs, a fund has been established for the family at Home Bank.

Contributions can be dropped off at any Home Bank location or mailed to:

Home Bank
Account #: 2057873802
Attn: Murphy Family Support Fund
P.O. Box 81459 Lafayette, LA 70598

Lauren Murphy added-- "We're just asking people for prayers and whatever they can give, just remember us and we just want to make sure our family gets back and we can lay our little sister to rest."

For more information about the Murphy Family Support Fund Care of Home Bank, please contact Nick Zaunbrecher at (337) 781-8494 or Home Bank at (337) 237-1960.

Jim Hummel

Permalink | Play Video| Comments