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Policewoman’s gifts
cheer Maui students
The kids' belongings were stolen
while they were on a trip to Oahu
Maui third-grader Kaui Harbottle, who lost six of her birthday gifts during a van break-in on Oahu earlier this month, was all smiles with the stuffed animals sent to her and fellow students by a Honolulu police officer.
She was so thrilled at her new bear that she named it Maylene, after officer Maylene Kellim, who sent two boxes of stuffed animals to students at Princess Nahi'ena'ena Elementary School.
"I felt so sad when we were robbed. It didn't feel good at all," Kaui said. "(But) my new bear is a big surprise. I'll never forget how the policewoman remembered us all."
The schoolchildren want to thank Kellim, a Pearl City police officer, for trying to cheer them up after their belongings were taken from their rental van at Pearlridge center while visiting Oahu earlier this month.
Kellim, one of the officers who responded to the theft call, said she thought the stuffed puppy dogs, seals and teddy bears of all shapes and sizes would comfort the 24 students Kellim saw crying their eyes out that day.
"They were all so traumatized because they just couldn't understand what was happening," she said. "The didn't understand why someone would take their stuff.
"It just seemed tragic. They didn't deserve that as little kids."
School officials received the boxes from Kellim on Wednesday and let the children open them up in the library that afternoon. But before they did, they were read a letter from Kellim that said: "It makes me sad that there are people who would do such an unkind thing to you. ... I am sending some of my friends over to cheer you up. Please give them names and a warm place to sleep."
Afterward, students opened the boxes with faces school officials could only describe as "ecstatic."
"There was no pushing and shoving," said Tommay Harbottle, a school staff member and adult chaperone during the Oahu trip. "But it was sort of like survival of the fittest.
"But nobody grabbed things and kept them. ... They passed the bears around nicely, discussed names and traded them until everybody had one they wanted.
"They were so amazed, just to know that somebody remembered them."
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