{"id":4078,"date":"2025-12-25T14:49:04","date_gmt":"2025-12-25T14:49:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2025\/12\/25\/lion-king-broadway-actress-dies-in-alleged-homicide\/"},"modified":"2025-12-25T14:49:04","modified_gmt":"2025-12-25T14:49:04","slug":"lion-king-broadway-actress-dies-in-alleged-homicide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2025\/12\/25\/lion-king-broadway-actress-dies-in-alleged-homicide\/","title":{"rendered":"Lion King Broadway Actress Dies in Alleged Homicide"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tImani Smith, the former child actor who starred in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/t\/broadway\/\" id=\"auto-tag_broadway_1\" data-tag=\"broadway\">Broadway<\/a>\u2018s <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/t\/lion-king\/\" id=\"auto-tag_lion-king_1\" data-tag=\"lion-king\">The Lion King<\/a><\/em>, has died.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tOfficers from the Edison Police Department found Smith with stab wounds on Sunday. She was transported to the hospital, where she was pronounced dead, per a <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.middlesexcountynj.gov\/Home\/Components\/News\/News\/1874\/736\">press release<\/a> from Middlesex County Prosecutor Yolanda Ciccone and Chief Thomas Bryan of the Edison Police Department. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tThe release further detailed that Jordan D. Jackson-Small has been arrested and charged with first-degree murder, second-degree endangering the welfare of a child, third-degree possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose and fourth-degree unlawful possession of a weapon tied to her death. \u201cSmith and Jackson-Small knew each other prior to the incident, thus it was not a random act of violence,\u201d the release added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tSmith starred as a Young Nala in the Broadway show based on the beloved Disney film from Sept. 2011-2012. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tKira Helper, Smith\u2019s aunt, organized a <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.gofundme.com\/f\/support-the-helper-family-after-the-tragic-loss-of-imani-dia?attribution_id=sl%3A562fc8be-1f68-4c6d-8ff3-f7be4f9d2613&amp;lang=en_US&amp;ts=1766418694&amp;utm_campaign=fp_sharesheet&amp;utm_content=amp17_tb&amp;utm_medium=customer&amp;utm_source=copy_link\">GoFundMe<\/a>, where she wrote that the actress was \u201csenselessly killed by her boyfriend.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\t\u201cImani had her whole life ahead of her. She was a vivacious, loving and fiercely talented person,\u201d Helper wrote on the fundraiser page. \u201cA true triple-threat performer, she most notably played the role of Young Nala on Broadway in Disney\u2019s <em>Lion King<\/em> \u2014 an experience that reflected the joy, creativity, and light she put into the world.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tHelper explained that the GoFundMe was organized to \u201csupport Imani\u2019s parents, Monique Rance-Helper and Rawni Helper, who are now facing the unimaginable: grieving their daughter while stepping in to raise her young son and support their two other children during this traumatic time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/  a-font-body-m     \">\n\tSmith is survived by her three-year-old son; her parents, Monique Rance-Helper and Rawni Helper; and two younger siblings. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Imani Smith, the former child actor who starred in Broadway\u2018s The Lion King, has died. Officers from the Edison Police Department found Smith with stab wounds on Sunday. She was transported to the hospital, where she was pronounced dead, per a press release from Middlesex County Prosecutor Yolanda Ciccone and Chief Thomas Bryan of the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4079,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[3664,2307,649,3971,3972,3970,3969],"class_list":{"0":"post-4078","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fashion","8":"tag-actress","9":"tag-alleged","10":"tag-broadway","11":"tag-dies","12":"tag-homicide","13":"tag-king","14":"tag-lion"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4078"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4078\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4080,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4078\/revisions\/4080"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}