Toddler’s Police Officer Father Dies, but Family Friend Comes to the Rescue

police death

Death is hard for anybody to handle, especially if you are a toddler. You don’t understand that if a parent is killed that they are not coming home ever again. The surviving parent, if there is one, has a long road in informing the child that daddy or mommy died and won’t be walking through the front door again.

Little two-year-old Malachi Snyder cried his eyes out because he didn’t see his daddy. His father Blake, a law enforcement officer, was killed while on duty.

A family friend decided to take some of the material from Blake’s uniform and create a couple of teddy bears that Malachi now hugs like it was his daddy. This doesn’t work for everybody, but it’s a great story nevertheless!

From InspireMore:

On October 6, Officer Blake Snyder, a four-year veteran on the force was killed in the line of duty while responding to a call in south St. Louis county. He was shot point blank in a normally peaceful park by a disturbed teen.

His son, 2-year-old Malachi, didn’t understand why his father was not coming home. “He’s been asking for his daddy a lot,” widow Elizabeth Snyder told Fox2Now. “Which is hard, because I don’t know how to respond to him yet, because every time I look at him, I’m reminded that my husband’s not coming home.”

To help the distraught toddler, a friend presented the family with two new teddy bears made of a very special fabric: his father’s police uniform.

Snyder’s wife, Elizabeth, posted the above photo to Facebook with the caption, “These beautiful bears were made for us from Blake’s uniforms ❤️”.

One bares a St. Louis Police Department patch, while the other has Officer Snyder’s police identification number stitched on the breast.

police death

We hope that everything turns out for the best for the Snyder family. We hope and pray that little Malachi grows up to be an outstanding member of the community.

I lost my dad in 1997, and I know how it feels to lose someone that you loved and treasured, but working with a toddler you have to do it very slowly, and I’m glad they are doing it that way.

What do you think about the family friend who took material from Malachi’s father’s uniform? That was quick thinking huh?

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Wayne is a freelance writer who was named the 2015 American Conservative Union Blogger of the Year and awarded... More about Wayne Dupree

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