Boy with disease reunited with stolen bike
Published: February 25, 2006
Erasmo Portillo knew something was up when his mother pulled him out of school Thursday afternoon but didn’t tell him where they were going.
The 10-year-old boy, who can’t walk due to spina bifida, has missed riding his specially designed bicycle since Saturday, when it was stolen overnight from his Chandler home.
When he and his mother pulled up to the Chandler police department Thursday, Detective Frank Mendoza had something to show him.
“Whoa!” Portillo shouted, his eyes wide, gleaming with surprise when he saw his recovered bike. “Thank you. Thank you,” he said as he hugged Mendoza.
Police said John Quiroz, a Union Pacific worker, said he saw the $1,200 bicycle being towed behind a man riding another bike Thursday morning as he was driving to work.
After hearing the special bike - which had been donated to Erasmo by Chandler Regional Hospital volunteers - was stolen, Quiroz approached the man towing it and told him they needed to call police.
The man towing it said he didn’t want to be involved and gave up the bike to Quiroz, who loaded it into his truck and drove it to the Chandler police department.
“Knowing that he was going to return the bike, to him, it was enough,” Mendoza said, explaining that Quiroz didn’t want to talk to the media.
Portillo said he rides his bike every day when he comes home from school. The bike, similar to a tricycle but bigger, operates by using handgrips rather than foot pedals. It can be used by children like Portillo who have a birth defect of the brain and spine that can cause paralysis.
Volunteers said the bicycles give children with spina bifida one more sense of accomplishing something on their own.
“I can’t believe they found it so fast,” said Alejandra Portillo, the boy’s mother. “I didn’t know if they were going to find it or if someone sold it.”
Sometime between 9 p.m. Saturday and 8 a.m. Sunday, Erasmo’s bicycle was stolen from his carport in the 2600 block of East Commonwealth Avenue, where the family said they keep it out of view from the street.
Chandler Regional Hospital volunteers had already decided to outfit Portillo with a new bike at their annual bike rally in April to replace the stolen one. But after finding his original, with only the seatbelt missing, Alejandra said perhaps another child could benefit from the one the volunteers were going to give him.
Barb Farmer, president of volunteer services at the hospital, offered a free tune up and seatbelt replacement to the family for the bike.
Alejandra said from now on, they’ll keep his bike inside or safeguard it so it’s not stolen again.
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