Lady Gaga’s dog walker, Ryan Fischer, has responded to accusations that she did not help him, following the shooting injuries he sustained when assailants attacked him and stole the singer’s dogs from his care. Fischer sat down with CBS Mornings host Gayle King to talk about the attack and his recovery, which included launching a GoFundMe to get help with medical costs and other expenses he incurred after being shot. It was the fundraiser project that sparked speculation regarding Gaga’s willingness to help Fischer herself.
“LG is very supportive of my journey right now and I think it’s hard for people to understand why someone would go about healing in this way,” Fischer explained, clarifying that he wanted his healing journey to be his own as much as possible. “I grew up Catholic Jesuit faith, and there’s something about giving up your resources, giving up belongings and contributing that to society.” He added, “And so I know that doesn’t make sense to a lot of people, [but] she totally gets it.”
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While he has retained a lot of self-sustainability with his healing journey, Fischer set the record straight on all the support that gaga has provided him. “She’s helped me so much,” he said. “She’s been a friend for me and after I was attacked, my family was flown out and I had trauma therapists flown to me and I stayed at her house for months while friends comforted me and security was around me.”
Notably, during the interview, Fischer also praised another person who helped him when he needed it most. After the suspects shot him in the shoulder, a man Fischer identified as Carlos came out to assist the wounded dogwalker. As Fischer describes it, Carlos was “an angel telling me that I’d be okay, like to keep my eyes open, to look at him, to keep breathing.”
“I had done trauma therapy in that night, but actually seeing Carlos, and seeing that same friendly, reassuring face helps me to realize that in that moment that I wasn’t alone. I wasn’t abandoned,” Fischer added. “He and other people did come out for me.” A total of five people were arrested in connection to the shooting and dognapping.
According to People, James Jackson, Jaylin White, and Lafayette Whaley were all charged with conspiracy to commit robbery, second-degree robbery, and attempted murder. The other two individuals, Jennifer McBride and Jaylin’s father, Harold White, were “determined to be accessories after the initial crime” and also charged. It was McBride who returned the dogs to authorities, two days after the attack.
