ATTLEBORO, MASS. (WHDH) - After Ariella Marie Ouellette’s “minute swing” was stolen from a playground memorializing the 2-year-old in Attleboro, her family is asking the thief to return it so other children can continue enjoying the playground.
Ariella Marie died in her bed shortly after her second birthday in 2017. Doctors determined she died of SUDC, or Sudden Unexplained Death in Children, and the family runs a foundation in her name to raise awareness for SUDC.
Alicia Ouellette, Ariella Marie’s mother, said she needed to honor her daughter, and said she loved to swing whenever she could. So the family worked with community members and created Ariella’s Playground on South Main Street.
“Every time she would ask to go swing on the swing we would always say ‘Yes, for a minute,’ so she always called it a minute swing,” Alicia recalled. “So on her sign [at the playground] it says ‘Come swing for a minute.'”
But this week, when her father and brothers went to the park, they found the swings had been cut down and the lights stolen. Alicia said police are investigating, but said she just wants the swings returned, no questions asked.
“I got really emotional and really sad because we worked really hard to get where we were and it just means so much to us,” Alicia said. “And it hit even closer to home because he was taking our children there to have a nice day to go and swing for a minute.”
Alicia said the swings were a way to remember her daughter’s joy in life.
“We love seeing other kids there obviously having fun and smiling and laughing and playing just like she would,” she said.
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