Stop thief! Teens swipe girl's donation jar

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LOWELL -- Police are looking for two young teens who went into a Broadway Street convenience store and stole a donation jar that was placed there by a 10-year-old girl who was raising money for poor children.

Officers were called to P&S Convenience, at Willie and Broadway streets, after a passing motorist saw a clerk chasing someone down the street last night about 9:15 p.m.

Store owner Peter Nhim said the clear plastic container had been chained and locked to the store's counter, but that one of the boys yanked on it hard enough that the plastic container broke free.

He chased the boys through the parking lot behind his store and saw them escape down Cross Street, toward Fletcher Street.

"I'm so upset right now. She worked hard on this thing," Nhim said of his 10-year-old daughter, Chresina, who was collecting the money. "Even kids put their change in there."

Nhim said there were $5 and $10 bills in the container.

He said his daughter was raising money to buy school supplies for poor children in Cambodia, since she had been there and met students who barely had any supplies.

She came up the idea on her own, and Nhim agreed to support it by putting a jar on his store's counter.

The jar was made of clear plastic, and bears a picture of a young girl, about 8 years old, holding a younger child.

"She was so happy," Nhim said of his daughter. "Right now if I called her she would cry."

The boy who grabbed the jar

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