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Woman's wheelchair stolen from Gillette during divisional playoff

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — For six years, Cindy Morais has had the same routine when she goes to a Patriots game.

Morais, who has cerebral palsy, leaves her wheelchair under the stairs of section 304 and climbs up to "her row" - it's the last row of the section.

She's had season tickets for six years and does this every time she's at the game.

"(I've been going) since the age of 5! Ever since I can remember," said Cindy Morais. "It's a family tradition, and I'm going to try to pass it on to my nephew and goddaughter."

The Providence resident went to Saturday's divisional playoff with her friends, bundled and ready to cheer.

"What a playoff game it was! We were up on our feet; chanting, yelling out “first down” and high fiving after each big play," said her friend Samantha Medeiros, who attended the game with her.

As usual, Morais had stored her wheelchair under the stairs. When she went to get it after the game, it was gone.

"I was expecting to see my chair at the end, one of my family members would normally go out in front and get my chair in preparation to meet me at the bottom of the stairwell," said Morais. "I was in shock when my family member said 'the chair is not there.'"

Morais tells us the wheelchair is a transport chair and that she mostly walks with a walker, but that upon learning her chair had been misplaced, Gillette called the EMTs who then accommodated her to be transported to her car.

"Honestly, at first, we couldn’t wrap our heads around that. Who goes and steals someone else’s wheelchair? Did someone think this would be a fun joke to play on someone? Did anyone see the chair get taken?" wrote Medeiros.

They contacted security at Gillette Stadium, who searched for the chair but didn't find it during their initial searches.

However, after a more thorough search on Monday, the wheelchair was located on the west side of the stadium, the opposite end of where she was seated.

Gillette personnel believe someone may have taken it for a "joy ride" and discarded it.

Upon learning about what had happened to Morais, Patriots' owner Robert Kraft himself called her to issue a personal apology.

Kraft invited Morais to go on the field at Sunday's AFC Championship game and will also be giving her a brand new wheelchair decked out Patriot's style.

As for the actual game on Sunday, Morais isn't doing anything to jinx the outcome.

"I'm gonna pull a Belichick here - one game at a time, hopefully we'll be at the Super Bowl on February 4th," said Morais.

UPDATED!!*** 1/15 First of all Cindy Morais and I would like to thank everyone who shared and/or commented on this...

Posted by Samantha Medeiros on Sunday, January 14, 2018