Rosalyn Johnson, 70, was left inconvenienced due to a female suspect stealing her electric wheelchair after she parked it at a location in Crown Heights, Brooklyn on September 1. Johnson had made a stop at a store while returning home from church when the wheelchair was swiftly stolen, ABC7 New York reported.
Surveillance footage later showed the suspected thief seated in the wheelchair and moving it on a sidewalk. “For it to be a woman you’re supposed to help other women,” Johnson said. “So some women they go astray. So it’s up to the women that’s not in this worldly life to bring them back.”
Johnson was sleeping when she suffered a stroke in 2011, resulting in her having to use a wheelchair. She said she did not envision things going further downhill as she’s been going through trying times already.
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“I felt like I wanted to choke her,” the 70-year-old grandmother said after her wheelchair was stolen. “But then I had to realize I just left church and that’s not what we do. But if I caught her I would have dragged her back to church to teach her a lesson. Thou shall not steal.”
The NYPD eventually helped put a smile on Johnson’s face when they gifted her a brand new electric wheelchair on Wednesday, September 25. The department purchased the wheelchair after raising $1,500 in donations from police foundation funds, ABC7 New York reported.
“I’m extremely happy for her that she can get back and get around town because she’s very mobile for her age and we want to keep her mobile here,” NYPD Deputy Commissioner, Kaz Daughtry, said.
The kind gesture from NYPD left Johnson shedding tears of joy. She also said she bears no ill will toward the suspect who stole her wheelchair. “You gotta have the power of forgiveness it makes you stronger,” Johnson said.
The suspected thief has since been declared wanted by Brooklyn police.
