Make-A-Wish statue back on display after being stolen in Phoenix [Video]

PHOENIX (AZFamily) — A statue of the original Make-A-Wish kid is back on display. It was stolen last year from the national headquarters here in Arizona.

Chris Greicius was just seven years old when he passed away from his battle with leukemia, but his memory and impact lives on at the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

His mom, Linda Pauling, is a co-founder and, on Tuesday, watched her son’s statue once again get placed where it belongs.

At four feet tall, a bronze statue of Chris Greicius is once again at Make-A-Wish Arizona. “We have our statue back. We have Christopher back for the world,” Pauling said.

For the last five years, it sat outside its National Headquarters near Highland Avenue and State Route 51 until it was stolen in January 2023. “It was like he’s ripped out of my heart again,” she said.

It took police a week to arrest the man who did …