DUI Task Force officers Jason Thompson (from left) and Stephen Kelly and DUI Task Force Sgt. Nick Krau bite into Bavarian cream donuts delivered by Tyler Carach on Wednesday afternoon at the Wailuku Police Station. The 11-year-old Florida resident, who has become known as “The Donut Boy,” is visiting Hawaii on his mission to deliver donuts to thank police officers across the country. Hawaii is the last of all 50 states he has visited. The Maui News / LILA FUJIMOTO photos
WAILUKU — As happy as they were to receive donuts, police officers were even more appreciative to have the chance to meet an 11-year-old Florida boy on a mission to thank every police officer in the country with a donut.
Tyler Carach, who has become known as “The Donut Boy,” wheeled a cart filled with boxes holding 20 dozen donuts through the Wailuku Police Station on Wednesday, making stops at the Chief’s Conference Room, Communications Section and Wailuku Patrol District.
“It was a great honor to see someone who actually has so much gratitude towards law enforcement,” said DUI Task Force officer Stephen Kelly. “He’s a cool kid.”
Kelly said he had heard about the Donut Boy and was following him on social media. After seeing Tyler had been to the Honolulu Police Department, Kelly learned the boy would be stopping at the Maui Police Department, too.
“I was really excited,” Kelly said. “It’s just amazing that the Donut Boy is here.”
Wearing a cape saying “I Donut Need A Reason To Thank A Cop,” Tyler Carach delivers donuts to police officers in the Chief’s Conference Room at the Wailuku Police Station on Wednesday afternoon. Tyler’s mother, Sheena Carach, helped pass out the donuts to officers including (from left) DUI Task Force officers Jason Thompson and Stephen Kelly and DUI Task Force Sgt. Nick Krau.
Kelly, fellow DUI Task Force officer Jason Thompson and DUI Task Force Sgt. Nick Krau took time to meet Tyler before heading out to do traffic enforcement Wednesday afternoon.
“I donut need a reason to eat a donut,” Krau said before picking out a Bavarian cream donut.
MPD was Tyler’s second-to-the-last stop in Hawaii, the last of 50 states he has visited. He planned to visit the Kauai Police Department today.
His mission started three years ago after he saw four deputies in a local store and asked his mother if he could use his allowance to buy mini donuts for them as a way to say thank you.
Afterward, he asked why the deputies were so excited about a snack. His mother told him they appreciated that he took the time to say thank you.
Police Chief Tivoli Faaumu (left) takes a donut delivered by Tyler Carach (center) while Assistant Chief Sterling Kiyota waits his turn Wednesday afternoon in the Chief’s Conference Room at the Wailuku Police Station.
She also told Tyler that “a lot of people judge a whole by a few so they are not very kind to police.”
“That made him really sad,” Sheena Carach said. “He said, ‘I’m going to thank every cop in America and buy them a donut.’
“It’s been amazing.”
While she drove to other states, Carach said it took longer to work out the logistics for a trip to Hawaii. “Then it became, like, a thing,” she said. “He was so excited to come to Hawaii.”
As it turned out, Hawaii was the easiest place to get sponsors, Carach said.
Safeway donated all the donuts. Hawaiian Airlines flew mother and son to the state as well as interisland. And Trump International Hotel in Waikiki provided the family’s accommodations for the week.
Tyler’s grandmother Debbie Lee, who made his cape saying “I Donut Need A Reason To Thank A Cop,” paid her own way because she had always wanted to visit Hawaii.
“Sometimes, we go places where they don’t support the police, and that breaks my heart,” Carach said. “If you send a sponsor letter to a bakery and they send you back something nasty, you just move on.
“We didn’t encounter anything like that here. It’s just been nice to be able to work with a place that’s that supportive.”
Police Chief Tivoli Faaumu, Deputy Chief Dean Rickard and Assistant Chiefs John Jakubczak and Sterling Kiyota picked out sprinkle-covered donuts from Tyler.
“It was very delicious,” Faaumu said. “I do love sweets. I don’t think it’s a good idea to leave a box. The chief might eat the whole box.”
Faaumu said he hoped that what Tyler was doing would be another step toward breaking down barriers between police officers and kids so “they feel comfortable coming to police officers and talking to us, and they feel comfortable just being around us.”
“I’m very impressed with what he’s doing, traveling around the map and passing out donuts,” Faaumu said.
Faaumu made Tyler honorary police chief Wednesday afternoon, and the boy took a seat between Faaumu and Rickard in the Chief’s Conference Room.
“His order for the day for me is to make sure everybody eats the donuts,” Faaumu said. “If not, I have to stay back and work one minute extra.”
While he was happy to hand out the donuts, Tyler said, “I don’t eat donuts much.”
“Ninety thousand donuts later, we’re going on a diet,” his mother joked.
Tyler, who will enter the 6th grade in Bratt, Fla., is the youngest of three children.
Carach previously worked as a city police officer in Virginia. Tyler also has an uncle who is a U.S. marshal and a cousin who is a New York state trooper.
After stops at police stations in the state this week, “he thinks he might be a police officer in Hawaii,” Carach said.
“I want to work here,” Tyler said.
His mother said Tyler started out using his allowance money to buy donuts before his mission evolved into a nonprofit organization a year and a half ago.
“He still, to this day, does a lot of chores to earn allowance money,” Carach said. “We don’t believe in handing our children something for nothing. If you want something in life, you have to work for it.”
In May, the National Police Defense Foundation honored Tyler with its 2019 Citizen of the Year award for his support of police throughout the nation.
He has an invitation to visit Italy, his mother said.
“If we can work it out, it will happen,” she said. “We still have a lot more to do in America. Tyler wants to thank them all.”
* Lila Fujimoto can be reached at lfujimoto@mauinews.com.
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