MEMPHIS, Tenn. — The Christmas Tree of one Memphis nurse is going to be a little bare underneath after thieves stole her presents.
It’s a sight no one wants to see leading up to Christmas: the sight of an empty front porch where packages are supposed to be waiting.
“I started checking around seeing if they were hidden somewhere, and I couldn’t find them,” said Lisa Dawson, a nurse from Memphis. “Somebody had just walked by, drove by, grabbed them, and took off.”
Dawson says around 10:30 that morning, she received an Amazon notification that her children’s Christmas presents were waiting for her at her front door on Walker Avenue in Midtown. But Dawson says she didn’t notice someone had walked off with them until hours later when she woke up after working a 12-hour shift as a nurse.
“I really hope that they need it for something like their own children, and were going to do something good with it and not just to take what wasn’t theirs,” Dawson said.
Dawson works at two Memphis hospitals where she takes on multiple 12-hour shifts a week. She says she’s recently had to pick up extra shifts since the hospitals are understaffed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
So, you can imagine her frustration to see all her presents to her kids were gone, but she’s says she also has a different perspective on the situation.
“But it was very minor compared to what I’ve seen others lose here lately,” Dawson said.
In Shelby County, COVID cases have been on a steady incline for weeks with many hospitals nearing capacity. Dawson says the majority of her patients are COVID patients and losing her gifts is nothing compared to what so many others have already lost.
“It was not going to be anything like losing somebody that I love or not being able to spend the holidays with somebody I love or see them because they’re in the hospital sick,” Dawson said.
Dawson says this is the first time she’s experienced this kind of theft in the 16 years she’s lived in this neighborhood. She hopes sharing her story will encourage others to be more cautious and thankful during the holidays.
Memphis Police say in order to protect yourself from porch pirates, request that your package require a signature before it’s left at the front porch. They also say you should request the delivery person to leave your package on the side of your home out of view from the street.
