Fairhaven Woman Asking For Help Recovering Irreplaceable Items

What began as an act of kindness quickly turned into a nightmare for one Fairhaven family.

A local resident recently moved to Fairhaven with her husband and kids and wanted to do something nice for the holidays. During her move, she was able to put together three giant contractor bags full of clothes to donate. She also had a couple of contractor bags that were filled with high-end shoes and boots, some of which even had the tags still on them. Since the family is still in the process of unpacking, the bags got mixed up, and well, I think you know what happened next.

The Fairhaven woman had asked her husband if he could bring the donations over to a Planet Aid bin that is located in the parking lot of the Fairhaven Stop & Shop. He accidentally grabbed all five bags, thinking they were all getting donated, and that's where the story goes south.

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The bags were dropped off at 8:15 p.m. and once she had realized her shoes were missing, the couple returned to the bin at 10:30 p.m. to find out that the bags were already scooped up.

Thousands of dollars worth of items were taken, but that's not what she is upset about.

"There were irreplaceable things in those bags, items you can't put a price on," she said. "I had a pair of handmade wooden sandals that my grandfather had made me. I carried those around with me since I was a little girl and now they're gone."

There were other important shoes in the bag, such as a pair of rhinestone sandals that her son had bought her for Mother's Day, purchased with the money from his very first paycheck. As a real estate agent, she had treated herself to a new pair of boots after her very first house sale to serve as a reminder that hard work pays off. These are just a couple of items that she is looking to get back specifically and will pay handsomely to whoever took them.

"I don't want anyone to think that they're in trouble," she added. "I just want these irreplaceable items back, that's all, and will pay thousands if I have to. It's not about losing money, I could care less about that, it's more about the emotional attachment I had on certain shoes that meant everything to me."

This can't have been the only time this has happened to anyone, so I called over to the Planet Aid customer service help desk. Lo and behold, the organization gets calls on a daily basis about items that were accidentally donated or perhaps got tossed into the bin by mistake. If caught in enough time, the drivers will be notified so they can unlock the bin and return the items to the owner.

Again, she is not looking for sympathy and has owned up to the miscommunication, but is asking for the community to at least keep an eye and an ear out. Any leads or ideas as to the whereabouts of this woman's shoes can be sent to Gazelle@Fun107.com.