After Susanna Parent’s bag was stolen June 18, 2024, from her vehicle in St. Paul, including her 10-month-old son’s baby book, she was grateful when staff at the Wilder Foundation found it and contacted her. She got the baby book back. (Courtesy of Susanna Parents)

A bag stolen from an Inver Grove Heights woman’s vehicle didn’t have money or credit cards in it, but a book inside was irreplaceable.

It was Susanna Parent’s 10-month-old son’s baby book, which included ultrasound photos, his newborn footprints and more. “I was devasted,” she said Monday.

Some people told Parent she should be hopeful and maybe it would turn up. “That was something I wanted to believe in, but didn’t really think would be a reality,” she said.

But it was.

Staff at the Wilder Foundation in St. Paul — near the site of the theft — found Parent’s bag, which was discarded by their loading dock, and the baby book was still inside. They used information from inside the bag to track down Parent.

The theft happened last Tuesday morning, when Parent brought her 4-year-old to a swimming lesson off University Avenue and Lexington Parkway in St. Paul. She locked a passenger door, believing that she was locking all the doors, but it turned out the other doors were unlocked.

Parent later realized her laptop bag had been stolen from her vehicle. She hadn’t brought her laptop with her that day (there was nothing of monetary value in the bag), but she and her daughter had been working that morning on filling out her youngest son’s baby book and it was in the bag. She filed a police report.

“I was just hoping and praying that somehow, someway it would get returned,” she said. “I knew it would have been a miracle for it to actually turn up.”

Letters that Parent had received were in her bag. Two front desk employees at the Wilder Foundation, Connie and Pazao, found Parent’s information on the envelopes. They tried sending messages to Parent and her husband on Facebook.

Meanwhile, Wilder’s property administrator, Tammi, searched Parent’s name online and discovered she’s a freelance writer. That helped her locate an email address.

Parent received an email telling her they’d found her bag, and Parent wrote back. She went to the Wilder Foundation, brought pastries as a “thank you” and met the people who’d helped her. Tammi asked that the workers only be identified by their first names.

“What my experience has shown me is … there are people out there that have good intentions and they will go out of their way in order to bless someone and in order to help someone else’s day be better,” Parent said.

Preventing theft from vehicles

There were 675 cases of theft from vehicles reported in St. Paul as of Monday, compared with 703 in the same time period last year, according to St. Paul Police Department data.

Police recommend that people:

Lock their vehicles.
Don’t leave items inside vehicles or ensure items are not visible from the outside.
Park in well-lit areas.

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