Help gunshot survivor Chinika Perez fix her van

Ronnie Polaneczky is organizing this fundraiser on behalf of Gloria Cruz.

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My friend Chinika Perez needs help fixing her wheelchair-accessible van. The 16-year-old vehicle has served her well, but its air-conditioning system is busted. This is a big issue for Chinika. Her medical condition causes her to overheat, so she didn’t get out much during this scorching Philly summer.

Also, the van’s tires – the ones it came with – needed replacing long ago. Plus, the fabric on the ceiling is falling apart.

“If we could at least fix the AC, I'd be so glad," says Chinika, 42. "I could get out of the house again!”

This is a small ask from someone whose gigantic cheerfulness belies the horror of what happened to her 16 years ago. It has impacted not just Chinika and her kids - Bianca, now 20, and Matthew, now 17 – but her mom, Gloria Cruz, who cares full-time for Chinika (who, with her kids, lives with Gloria).

In 2006, Chinika, then 27, was living happily and independently, raising her young children in the house she owned a few miles from the restaurant where she’d worked for years. The regular customers loved her sunny smile, playfulness, and kindness. Co-workers loved her work ethic and enthusiasm.

Everything changed on August 12th of that year, when she was shot on a Philly street by an acquaintance. The bullet tore through her right thigh and hit her femoral artery, causing swift, massive blood loss. By the time police got her to Temple University Hospital, she had no pulse.

Temple's ER heroes were able to save Chinika's life. But they couldn’t save her limbs, which slowly withered or died from the catastrophic result of her injury.

Her right leg is amputated at the hip, her left one below the knee. Her hands are frozen at right angles to her wrists, and her fingers are immobile.

I wrote about Chinika, when I was a columnist at The Philadelphia Daily News, at the suggestion of Scott Charles, the trauma outreach coordinator at Temple Hospital. Gun deaths make headlines, he said, but the lifelong consequences of gun injuries rarely do. He thought Chinika’s story deserved telling.

Besides, he added, “There is something so sweet and positive about her. She lights up the room. Go meet her. You’ll see.”

(Chinika and Bianca, then 7, on the cover of the Daily News.)

He was right. I fell in love with Chinika, wrote her story, and Daily News readers fell in love with her, too. They donated more than $1,800 to help with her bills, and volunteers built a wheelchair ramp so she could get in and out of her Olney rowhouse more easily.

(From the Philadelphia Daily News)

But the most exciting gift came from the late, great Kobe Bryant, who heard about Chinika and – with no fanfare – bought her a brand-new 2006 Dodge Caravan (retrofitted by Conicelli Auto in Conshohocken) to accommodate her wheelchair. (Click here to read more about it.) By then, a vehicle for the family was desperately needed: Gloria’s car had been stolen just days before the Daily News story appeared.

(Left to right: Temple Hospital's Scott Charles, Chinika Perez and daughter Bianca, Kobe Bryant, and Chinika's son Matthew, in 2006)

(Left to right: Gloria Cruz, Matthew, Kobe Bryant and Bianca.)

Sixteen years later, “Kobe’s Van,” as Chinika and her family still lovingly call it, needs some repairs.

Meanwhile, the family has thrived since those uncertain early days of Chinika's recovery.

Bianca is studying at Community College of Philadelphia; she wants to work in the legal field. Matthew is a high-school junior and an excellent athlete who hopes to play basketball in college. Gloria - who had to give up her housecleaning business to care for Chinika - has adapted well to Chinika and the kids living with her full-time.

And Chinika is still smiling and thankful that she survived that shooting so many years ago. She worked briefly in victim advocacy at Temple Hospital, but the job was funded by a grant, which ended. She enjoyed being useful to those in need, reminding them that we are all stronger than whatever happens to us. She hopes to find a similar position soon because she has so much to give. When she does, she’ll need a reliable vehicle so her mom or daughter can drive her there. And it would be a joy to keep "Kobe's Van" going for a few more years.

(Chinika's daughter Bianca and mom Gloria are her chauffeurs)

(Chinika and Bianca.)

Hence this GoFundMe. If you can donate, I promise you'll bring new joy to a really wonderful family. And if you can't, perhaps you could share this page with others. In either case, thank you for taking the time to read this post.

On behalf of Chinika and her loved ones, bless you all!