Overview
- Darron Lee has been charged with first-degree murder, with one report also noting an evidence-tampering charge, in the February death of Gabriella Perpétuo in Ooltewah, Tennessee.
- Prosecutors say phone data show exchanges with ChatGPT asking how to handle an unresponsive person, whether injuries could resemble a fall, what to tell 911, and how to cover it up.
- Body-camera footage presented in court captured Lee telling officers he did not know what happened and claiming he had been upstairs or sleeping.
- An autopsy detailed extensive injuries, including facial trauma, fractured cheekbone and front teeth, stab wounds to the chest and thigh, a bite mark, and a perimortem upper-spine fracture.
- Investigators reported blood throughout the home and in Lee’s BMW, and Perpétuo’s family has launched a GoFundMe and filed a $50 million wrongful-death lawsuit.