News and HeadlinesNational News

Actions

Vandals damage Christmas inflatables put up for Brody Allen, Ohio boy with terminal brain cancer

Posted
and last updated

COLERAIN TOWNSHIP, Ohio -- Police are looking for someone who is destroying Christmas inflatables that have been set up early so a child with terminal brain cancer can celebrate the holiday early.

Someone cut a Santa Claus yard decoration near the home of 2-year-old Brody Allen, neighbor Perry Mattan said. The boy won't reach Dec. 25, oncologists at Children's Hospital in Cincinnati predicted in August. But his parents are determined to give him a Christmas anyway, and so is Mattan.

Mattan says he has patched up the inflatables the two times they’ve been deflated. 

“It's nice seeing the love, but then you got that .1 percent that want to kind of ruin it for that little boy, and I just don't get it, just cowards,” Mattan said.

Todd Allen, Brody’s father, said it’s disheartening to see people destroy decorations put up to honor his son’s last wish.

“It's Christmas -- you can pop Santa, we're just going to put him right back up,” Allen said. “You can't break Christmas."

Mattan said if the vandals try to ruin the inflatables again that he’ll be back to repair them.

“We'll fix it again … we're just doing it because that little boy should be happy the rest of the time he's here on this earth,” Mattan said.