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12-Year-Old Girl Gets New 'Christmas Gift' from Local Precinct

By Carolina Pichardo | February 12, 2016 6:19pm | Updated on February 15, 2016 8:54am
 Police got Yasmeli Gomez a new iPad air to replace a Christmas gift that was robbed.
12-Year-Old Girl Gets New Christmas Gift from Local Precinct
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WASHINGTON HEIGHTS — The daily roll call for the 33rd Precinct Thursday afternoon included more than 20 police officers and one very excited 12-year-old girl.

Police invited Yasmeli Gomez, of Washington Heights, to check out officers in action, get a tour of the precinct, and get a new “Christmas gift,” an iPad, from Det. Anthony Spennicchia.

Gomez, police said, was robbed of her hoverboard on Saturday, Dec. 26 at 10:20 p.m., as she played outside her brother’s building on 170th Street and Broadway. Gomez’s mother, Yineli Mendoza, said the young girl got the hoverboard as a Christmas present.

Two teens, one male and one female, snatched the gift away from her and ran, police said.

Gomez then sat on the ground and cried, before her parents called 911 to report the robbery, police said.

After the report came in, the case was forwarded to Spennicchia, who immediately began making phone calls and looking for surveillance video. He found footage of the two teenagers, police said, and they were arrested last month. 

It was during the investigation, police said, that Gomez expressed interest in police work and wanting to join the force in the future.

“She struck a chord with me,” Spennicchia said, adding that he has a daughter himself and doesn’t feel a child should be a victim of a crime.

Spennicchia said he then began to plan and reach out to other officers in the precinct to help replace the the hoverboard with a different gift because they're illegal in New York City. He spoke to Gomez’s mother and agreed on getting the girl a new iPad Air instead.

“It is a lot better,” Mendoza said, citing her concerns for safety with the hoverboard. The hoverboard, she said, was a gift from Gomez’s older brother.

Gomez, who began to cry when the detective presented the gift during roll call, said she was very happy with her first visit to a precinct.

"I saw them arrest some bad guys!" she said.

But most of all, Gomez the youngest of 18 siblings, said she's happy she doesn't have to share her iPad with her older sister.

"My sister has her own [smart] phone, and now I have this," she said, holding on tightly to her new gift.