Tiktok star speaks out after her son's alleged killer is arrested: 'grateful, but not happy'

TikTok star Ophelia Nichols says she is "grateful, but not happy" after an arrest was made in her son's murder. Nichols' son Randon Lee was fatally shot at a gas station

in Prichard, Alabama, in June. He was 18. On Thursday, 20-year-old Reuben Gulley was arrested in connection with the death, WALA-TV reported. Montgomery County jail records confirm Gulley is

in custody on a single charge of murder. Now, Nichols — known on TikTok as @shoelover99 and Mama Tot — is speaking out. "I'm getting a hundred messages saying, 'You must be

so happy right now,' and I am not. I am not happy," Nichols said in a TikTok video posted Friday. "When I seen that mugshot last night, I thought to myself, 'My goodness,

he's just a baby,' " she added. She said she saw comments from Gulley's former teachers who described him as "a lovely young man." "I bet he was,"

Nichols said of Gulley. "That just made me think, within 11 seconds, he made the decision to just throw his life away." The "one thing" her son and Gulley share, Nichols

said, is that they "both have a mother that would do absolutely anything for them. I'm sure they had that in common." "So remember this, there's now two families

that are hurting, there's two of us. And those parents shouldn't suffer for something that their child did, just as well as I shouldn't suffer for anything that my children

have done," Nichols said. She recalled hearing negative comments made about her son from others in her town after his death and said she prays Gulley's mother doesn't have to

experience the same thing. "I don't wish that on anybody. That was really hard for me. Neither one of our children should've been there that night. Neither one of them,"

she said. After a brief pause, Nichols said that while it's difficult to think about what could have been, "I know it's going to be a long road to justice. I hope it's

done right, as it should." She reminded her supporters, "There are two families hurt, not just me. There's also a lot of other families in that town that never got justice

that should." "Grateful, but not happy," she wrote over the video. _WANT TO KEEP UP WITH THE LATEST CRIME COVERAGE? SIGN UP FOR_PEOPLE'_S FREE TRUE CRIME NEWSLETTER__ FOR

BREAKING CRIME NEWS, ONGOING TRIAL COVERAGE AND DETAILS OF INTRIGUING UNSOLVED CASES. _ In the comment section, one fan asked Nichols if she would be willing to talk to Gulley or his

mother. "Of course I would," she responded. According to Prichard police, Lee met up with two individuals at a gas station to sell them marijuana the night he was killed. Shortly

after, he was allegedly shot by one of the suspects inside his car, PEOPLE previously reported. Following the shooting, the suspects allegedly fled and Lee pulled out of the gas station and

into another, where he succumbed to his injuries. Gulley was denied bond, WALA reported. It was unclear Friday if he entered a plea to the charge or retained an attorney to comment on his

behalf.