Update -- Wednesday 6 p.m.: A Fox 2 follow-up on the letter it got from a Macomb mother of two adds a feel-good coda to her touching account of a crime she feared "will cost me dearly."
"There are a few people offering to help Stephanie [Irvine] get a new car," Randy WImbley reports at Fox 2, which had posted her open letter chastising the thief or thieves for "a selfish act."
Stephanie Irvine: "I know what's it like to not have things. . . . But it doesn't make it okay to take things." (Fox 2 photo)
Her story of a swiped Neon "touched the hearts" of viewers and online readers, the reporter says, with one offer of help coming from Ford Road Motor Sales in Dearborn. "I think we can help you out," a representative tells Irvine by phone, according to Fox 2.
The daytime theft occurred June 23 "when Stephanie drove her two daughters to Midtown Detroit," as Wimbley describes it.
One of them checked out a performance at Great Lakes Coffee. The other went to Detroit Institute of Arts, the Detroit Public Library and the Detroit Historical Museum with mom. . . .
They parked their car on Cass just north of Alexandrine. . . . But when their day in Detroit was over, the car was gone. . . .
"I know what's it like to not have things, to want things. Like we go without things all the time. But it doesn't make it okay to take things. I was angry that that's all I had and somebody took it."
Original article, Wednesday 4 p.m.:
A Utica mom sends an open letter to a TV station as a way of venting anger and pain over being a car theft victim while visiting Detroit, as she tells it.
The correspondent, who isn't identified by Fox 2, says a shabby Dodge Neon that she bought used was swiped recently while parked. The station posts what it calls "the moving letter," adding that it has the sender's name and will follow up if she grants an interview.
"I'd like to think you took my car because you needed money to feed your family," writes a single mom who lost a beat-up Neon. (Staged photo)
Here's what the suddenly carless Macomb County parent says:
Dear Person(s) who stole my car:
I'm not sure what your situation is, but let me share a little about mine. I am a single mother of two children. It took me over a year to pay $1,200 for that ugly, old, beat-up Neon you took from me.
I moved my children and myself back into my mother's house not too long ago because I couldn't afford living on my own. We all have to share one room. I finally got a halfway decent-paying job and was going to start school in the fall. I needed that car more than anything.
I, myself, have $30 to my name. Replacing that car will cost me dearly. It will deprive my children of simple basic wants and needs.
I hope that your situation was far worse than mine. I'd like to think you took my car because you needed money to feed your family. I'd like to think that you were so desperate and had no one to turn to.
But in my heart, I know it was a selfish act. You took it simply because you wanted to and you feel you have the right to take what you want. The next time you are looking around your once-beautiful, thriving city and wonder where it all went wrong, take a look in the mirror. It is YOU that keeps it from being great.
