It was a routine investigation into a shoplifting incident at a local discount store. But the story has an extraordinary ending thanks to the generosity of a police officer who decided to offer the shoplifter a helping hand.
The sweet story begins on November 19, when Officer Michael Kotsonis was called to an Ocean State Job Lot in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. CBS reports that employees had spotted a woman shoplifting in the store that day, and thanks to surveillance footage, Kotsonis was able to track the shoplifter down.
But when Kotsonis got to the woman’s home to retrieve the stolen items, he was taken aback by what he found.
The shoplifter, it turned out, had stolen cake mix, shortening and some frosting. She had wanted to make a birthday cake for her child.
“It doesn’t make it right,” Kotsonis told the Portsmouth Herald of the mother’s thieving. But he was moved to do something to help her.
Kotsonis brought the stolen items back to the store, but once there, he told the manager that he wanted to purchase all of it.
“I’m not going to take away a kid's birthday cake,” he told the Herald. “I ended up bringing it back to the mother.”
Kotsonis said he hadn't wanted any attention for the generous gesture, which he said was similar to acts of kindness that his fellow officers “do all the time.” It was an employee at the store who shared the officer’s good deed with the media.
“[It was] pretty typical of this particular officer and a lot of police officers,” Lt. Darrin Sargent, Kotsonis' colleague, told CBS. “They don’t look for recognition for the good things that happen. I think it happens more often than we know.”
On Facebook this week, the Portsmouth Police Department praised Kotsonis for “shining a light on an otherwise darker moment in someone's life."
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