Maliyah Roberts, 6, has a new wheelchair to help her get around thanks to a generous gift from strangers.
Two anonymous donors dropped off replacement wheelchairs to Boston police after the child’s chair was stolen from outside her family’s home in Brighton.
Gabriella Rodriguez, Maliyah’s mother, said someone saw her daughter’s story on the news and was moved to take action.
“The police came here from District 14 up the street and said that someone had dropped off a wheelchair and a walker at around three in the morning,” Rodriguez said Monday.
Rodriguez said she first noticed the customized wheelchair was missing from their home in Brighton on Friday.
“I checked inside, checked all over the basement. It wasn’t there. Called everyone; that’s when I realized it was gone. It was just gone,” Rodriguez said Sunday.
The family kept the wheelchair outside because of the stairs to their apartment.
“It angers me that they took it from her, it really does, because she doesn’t deserve it. Going through everything she already went through in her life, just from birth,” Maliyah’s father, Keith Roberts, said Sunday.
Maliyah experienced a traumatic birth. Her mother said Maliyah went without oxygen for six minutes and didn’t have a heartbeat for 18 minutes. She survived but suffered brain damage, and can’t walk by herself.
“She doesn’t know yet. We’ve kind of been keeping it from her because those are her wheels,” Rodriguez said. “She was supposed to go to camp. She can’t go to camp now without it, and she was loving it there.”
Rodriquez told 7News Maliyah can’t legally get on the school bus without her wheelchair.
The couple have since reported the wheelchair as stolen. They are also reaching out to their insurance company, but they’re worried because they waited six months to receive Maliyah’s first chair.
Boston police said Monday that there is still an active investigation going on to find out who stole the wheelchair.
Maliyah’s father pleaded for the person who took the chair to return it, saying, “If you’re the person that took it, bring it back. Honestly, just bring it back.”
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