GoFundMe shuts down viral $745,000 fundraiser for 81-year-old Texas driver, refunds all donors

GoFundMe has deactivated a viral fundraiser that raised nearly $745,000 for an 81-year-old Texas man, after discovering the woman running it was not a neighbour but the man’s daughter posing as one.

Donald Johnson of The Colony, Texas, became an internet sensation after doorbell footage showed him hauling lost luggage to a customer’s door in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. He had worked for three years as an independent contractor delivering lost luggage, routinely pulling 14-hour days and driving hundreds of miles to pay for his wife Josephine’s treatment for aggressive pancreatic cancer, according to the family.

A woman calling herself Erin Howell set up the fundraiser on September 2 and told donors she was Johnson’s neighbour. GoFundMe received a tip on September 25 and its Trust & Safety team opened an investigation. On a recorded call, the platform asked the organiser directly whether Don and Josephine were her parents; she said they were. The organiser was Johnson’s daughter, Amy Johnson.

GoFundMe said it uncovered “factual misrepresentations” and that misrepresenting an organiser’s identity or relationship to the beneficiary breaches its terms, regardless of intent. The company removed the campaign and refunded every donor.

Amy Johnson has since launched a new fundraiser on GiveSendGo, where she maintains that “the doorcam video is real. The diagnosis is real. The job is real”, and says her father still works 14-hour days while her mother battles pancreatic cancer.