Theft Strikes the Trotters Not Once, But Twice

My name is Sarah Gerstner. I am a long time friend of Tara's. It took a lot of arm twisting and a little yelling at Garrick to get them to agree to this. Let me tell you a little about them.

Tara is a middle school teacher in Portage, Garrick works in manufacturing for Stryker. They have one small daughter who is three, and an active foster placement who is 6.5 months old.

On December 15, 2023 their world was turned upside down when one of their cars was stolen out of driveway in the early hours of the morning. In the car were hundreds of dollars in car seats, a stroller, diaper bag, Christmas gifts, and other incidentals. They thought that was the end of the nightmare.

Then on December 16, credit inquiries started popping up indicating both Tara and Garrick’s identities had been breached. The thief made a flurry of credit requests to both Tara and Garrick's credit. Compromising both. So on top of car theft they also had to add reports for identity theft.

The next week started to calm, as much as it can the week before Christmas, and Garrick awoke on Friday, December 22, to go to work, to find that the thief had come back to help himself to our second vehicle. Upon reviewing a neighbors Ring footage they found he had someone drive the other stolen car back to steal their second. Merry freaking Christmas, right? In that car again were hundreds of dollars of car seats, the double stroller, the other diaper bag, baked beans meant to be made for a dinner for the unhoused for Christmas, a garage door opener, and many other incidentals.

There has been very little progress made by the police at this moment. Their savings has been depleted already by changing locks, garage door openers, buying and adding cameras, rental deposits, replacing some holiday gifts for the girls, paying for police reports to file fraud on credit accounts they didn’t open, etc. Still come are the car deductibles, the homeowner deductibles, replacement of goods, down payments on two new vehicles, new strollers for the girls, and honestly things haven’t even been thought of yet.

Tara and Garrick are proud people. They hate asking for help, and much prefer to do the helping, but feel like our current circumstances have left us without much choice. Tara called me and asked how many beans she needed to replace. Seriously woman?!?! You CARS were just stolen! Worry about yourself instead of the unhoused! But this is the kind of people they are.

Please help me, help them! Their insurance won't cover replacing anything without them purchasing it first, THEN reimbursing them. The expenses are going to be astronomical. We all know things are more expensive now than ever. Give as you can, they will be eternally grateful!