A Christmas blessing
Emry Dinman/Columbia Basin Herald Officer Travis Ruffin fills a shopping cart with a local child as part of the annual Shop With a Cop, when the Moses Lake Police Department and the Grant County Sheriff’s Office team up to bring a little Christmas cheer to families in need.
Richard Byrd/Columbia Basin Herald Grant County Sheriff’s Deputy Jake Fisher discusses the finer points of Nerf weaponry with 7-year-old Ocie Richie of Moses Lake at Tuesday’s Shop with a Cop event.
MOSES LAKE — LaDonna Richie couldn’t have asked for a more random call – or a more impactful and much-desired one, for that matter. When Richie received a call one day a weeks back and was informed about the possibility of her 7-year-old son Ocie participating in Shop With a Cop this year she was, to say the least, surprised.
“I was so shocked mainly because I didn’t even know Shop With a Cop was a thing! I was like ‘how cool is that,’” Richie said with a contagious laugh in the Moses Lake Walmart Tuesday night.
Ocie was one of several local kids who were paired with cops and deputies for Shop With a Cop, which annually takes local needy kids out on shopping sprees in the days before Christmas. Each of the kids is brought through the store during the event, with a lot of the kids flocking, as expected, to the toy and electronics aisles. Ocie was no different. He had quite the discussion with Deputy Jake Fisher about which Nerf gun is superior in living room battles.
“Oh, wait,” Ocie told Fisher while browsing through Nerf gun ammo. “I guess then if I get that one then I should get something for my brother too.”
Every year the deputies and officers who participate in Shop With a Cop speak highly of the generosity of the kids who participate in Shop With a Cop. That’s because every year the kids will devote a portion of their holiday shopping spree money to their family members, and Tuesday night was no different.
“You know a blessing when you see it. This feels like a blessing. We just moved here last February, so I was really hoping, and praying, and not knowing what we were going to do for Christmas this year,” said Richie, who happens to work at the Moses Lake Walmart. “So this is just a major blessing for us. He will be talking non-stop about this for the foreseeable future.”
The annual outing is made possible through various donations and fundraising endeavors throughout the year, like Tip a Cop two weeks ago at Rock Top Burgers & Brew in Moses Lake, which raised around $5,000 for the Shop With a Cop cause and involved cops and deputies working the tables at the restaurant and gathering tips.