Thieves steal cancer patient’s donations

Jason LaMonaca always had a nervous stomach, so the nausea brought on by a roast-pork feast after a Nov. 2006 Eagles game wasn’t much concern. He waited until after Thanksgiving to see a doctor.

“I literally came out of the anesthesia to the sound of my aunt [who works at Mercy Health at Fitzgerald Hospital] crying,” LaMonaca, 38, said. “They told me I had a tumor in my colon, most likely cancerous.”

It was cancer and a long battle began. But the lowest point came last Thursday after a doctor’s visit. When he got back to his mother’s house in Folcroft, the side door was kicked in and burglars made off with jewelry, collectibles and $1,700 that three friends recently raised in his honor. He thought the money was more to keep “paying it forward” to cancer patients in need of financial support. “I didn’t realize that I was the one who needed it now,” he said.

Phone lines were cut to disable the alarm and neighbors told LaMonaca two men broke in while one waited in the truck outside. Folcroft police, who were on the scene within minutes, could not be reached.

“I wouldn’t say it’s defeatist, but this all has been a crushing blow,” said La-Monaca, who restarts chemotherapy on July 8. “Makes me wonder if I was some evil person in a previous life.”