Eight-year-old Luke Huff of Lubbock felt mad when he realized his bike had been stolen. His home was robbed this week, and his beloved bike was one of many things stolen. The loss of his bike could have spelled out a disappointing end to summer for Luke, but two Lubbock Police officers turned things around by replacing his missing bike.
Luke spent much of his summer hanging out at Tommy’s Famous Burgers where his mom Jennifer Licon works. Rather than staying with his grandma for the summer, Luke would hang out with his mom at Tommy’s, helping out by cleaning tables and refilling drinks for customers.
Several Lubbock Police officers are regular customers at Tommy’s, Licon said that the officers asked why Tommy hadn’t been riding his bike recently. She explained to them that the bike had been stolen.
They returned to Tommy’s early in the afternoon Tuesday and approached Luke. Luke recalls the officers being very serious
“I was like on the sidewalk [next to Tommy’s] and he walked over there and said go get your mom please,” Luke recounted. “And I thought my mom was about to go to jail, except she wasn’t.”
Luke’s mother also recalled the police officers seeming stern, they told her she needed to step outside and she worried that Luke had gotten into trouble.
But when Luke and his mother were outside, they said the officers stepped forward and revealed a new bike behind them and gave it to Luke.
“I was like, that can’t be for me,” Luke said. Apparently, he had been eyeing the same bike at Walmart for a while.
“And they picked the exact colors we wanted and everything and they didn’t even ask, that was what was crazy about it,” Licon said.
She recalled that she and Luke stood in shock and cried.
Luke has already taken his new bike for a ride, he loves it.
“I’m keeping it in my house, I’m not letting that one get stolen,” he said.
The Lubbock Police Department caught word of this good deed as well, Lt.Ray Mendoza explained that stories like this about his fellow officers makes him emotional.
“Well, I am extremely proud of these officers, I’m extremely proud of every officer, but these guys went above and beyond and they didn’t want any recognition,” Mendoza said.
EverythingLubbock.com requested an interview with the two officers who bought the bike, but they declined, they were surprised someone had heard about what happened.
“They immediately said hey, we did it out of the goodness of our hearts, we didn’t want any attention from it, it was just something where spur of the moment they felt like God put them in the right place at the right time for this,” Mendoza said.
He said the officers told him when they went to Walmart to purchase the bike, the salesperson was moved by their act of kindness for Luke and offered them a discount on the bike as well.
Both Luke and his mom say they are extremely grateful to Lubbock Police.
“Right now officers are getting a lot of bad publicity and I know our Lubbock cops really work hard, they have good hearts they do a lot for our community and I want to thank all of them for what they do,” Licon said.
“They just don’t really know how much they helped me out, because I do work really hard and it makes me angry that people take from us, because we do work hard for what we got,” Licon added. “But we’ll just keep working hard, good thing we have these guys to keep us safe.”
