Massachusetts Police Officer Shows the True Spirit of Christmas

Maybe 2021 is going to be the year of acts of kindness.  Sometimes we come to a fork in the road and we make choices and have no idea of how life could be if we made a different choice.

According to CNN.com, when Somerset Police Officer Matt Lima was called to a local Stop & Shop grocery store for a case of suspected shoplifting on December 20, he faced a choice.

I think he made the right call.

According to store security and reporting by CNN.com, the two women, who were with their small children, went through a self-checkout and did not scan all their items. When Officer Lima arrived at the store, he took the women aside while store employees kept the children busy so they would not overhear the conversation that Officer Lima had with the women.

They told the officer that they were just trying to buy food to provide Christmas dinner for their children and were paying just for the items they could afford but did not have enough, CNN stated. After Officer Lima checked the receipt, it turned out the women were just buying food and had not scanned several food items, the news station said.

Officer Lima told WJAR as reported by CNN.com that “The woman I talked to, she explained that she was working, but the mother of the children was not working and had some other family issues going on and that what she had taken was Christmas dinner for the kids.”

The Officer issued the woman a notice, not to trespass but did not press shoplifting charges, according to the story.

But it doesn’t end there.

Officer Matt Lima then bought the women a $250 gift card at another grocery store so they could buy their groceries, according to the article, and he paid for the gift card out of his own pocket.

This story restored my hope in humanity.  Officer Lima went above and beyond.  That makes him my hero.