Community Comes Together In Face Of Tragedy, Replaces Stolen Donation Box

EAST BRUNSWICK, N.J. (CBSNewYork) --A New Jersey neighborhood turned tragedy into triumph, when they replaced a donation box that someone stole over the weekend.

As CBS2's Weijia Jiang reported, the donation box meant to help a high school student who was paralyzed while playing hockey went missing from a popular holiday light display in New Jersey.

"They just ripped the whole thing out of the ground," Lori Logan said.

The Kloos family in East Brunswick has been putting on the light show for a decade.

The family estimates there was between $250 and $400 in the box, which was discovered missing Monday morning. The proceeds were meant for Monroe High School student Mikey Nichols, who suffered a severe spinal cord injury in January.

Bill Kloos, who runs the light show with his brother, said he was shocked when he found out the box was gone.

"In 10 years that we've been doing this display we've never had anything stolen," Kloos told 1010 WINS.

"On any given night -- especially from now until Christmas time -- you'll see 500-600 cars here a night, and we want it like that because more cars mean more donations. That's ultimately what this display is for -- to bring the community together," Kloos told CBS2's Meg Baker.

Following the theft, the family decided to go dark and turn the lights off, but have since had a change of heart.

"We want to take this horrible situation of what happened and make the most out of it," the family wrote on Facebook. "So let's all band together and use this as an encouragement to raise the most money for any cause in Kloos Family Lights history!"

The community helped set up a new donation box. The new box is bolted into a tree with a huge chain around it.

"The spirit of this holiday season is just so heart warming. People are good," Steven Nichols said.

After the accident, Nichols was in need of round-the-clock home care. His house was remodeled to accommodate his wheelchair, putting a financial burden on the family.

"Much money was needed to do the things that we had to have done around the house to make it accessible for Mike. The money that has been raised goes into a special needs trust that can only be used for Mikey. We never asked for this fundraising. Social media definitely helped us," said Nichols' father, Steven.

Stronger than ever, Mikey Nichols said he hopes to start a charity to raise awareness of spinal cord injuries. He has spun this negative into a positive.

"I would like to thank the community. I don't want to fault anyone in the community. It's a world of great people and one bad person isn't going to change how I see my community. They have been wonderful to me," Nichols said.

"You don't think you can handle this and you can't handle it alone, and then all of a sudden you find out that you're not alone. We found out in our darkest day we are not alone. He is not alone," said Nichols' mother, Christine.

Kloos said they will be building a bigger and better donation box.

"It's going to be a lot more reinforced, it's going to weigh a lot so you're not going to be able to just rip it right off," Kloos said. "Our plan is to just simply empty it a couple of times a night and at the end of the night leave the box wide open so the box doesn't get stolen again."

The family is hoping to raise $5,000 for Mikey Nichols.

The lights were to back on Tuesday night. The event runs from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. nightly, weather permitting, into January.

Meanwhile, East Brunswick police are investigating and will be stepping up patrols at night.

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