Lakewood Police lift spirits of girl battling childhood leukemia after comfort bag stolen

LAKEWOOD, Colo. -- There’s no way a parent can be prepared for the news that their child has cancer. But that’s the word the Burgess family from Lakewood received over the summer.

Jacob and Stacey Burgess noticed their 7-year-old daughter Taylor, who’s a huge bundle of energy, was taking two or three naps a day and that her energy had faded.

“We were able to figure out, okay, something is wrong with her blood, the platelets, the red blood cells. Things aren’t working efficiently, but [we] never thought Leukemia,” said Jacob Burgess.

After Taylor’s diagnosis, the family began making regular overnight trips to Children’s Hospital of Colorado and put together an overnight bag they can grab at the last minute if necessary.

But recently, ahead of an overnight stay at the hospital, the family’s overnight bag was stolen out of their car.

“They just came through the car and they shuffled through the papers and just took it,” said Taylor Burgess.

The family filed a police report, but never expected anything to come from it -- until an officer contacted them wanting to not only replace their bag and contents inside, but collect money for them too.

“They poured tons of stuff. They just gave gift certificates for the kids to go to this toy store and a gift certificate for us to go out to dinner,” said Stacey Burgess.

The Burgess family said the giving hasn’t stopped there. 

About a dozen police officers recently made a personal appearance to the family's home to surprise Taylor, even giving her a ride in a patrol car.

“I was, like, so surprised. We even drove around the block. I got to turn on the lights of the car and we even got to turn on the sirens once we got back on the street,” said Taylor Burgess.

The Burgess family is optimistic Taylor will make a full recovery -- in part because recent studies show 98 percent of kids diagnosed with childhood leukemia enter remission within weeks of beginning treatment and 90 percent of those diagnosed are cured.