DETROIT (WXYZ) — Thieves targeted a learning garden on Detroit's east side twice over the Fourth of July weekend, stealing dozens of chickens, geese, and vegetables from a nonprofit that serves young adults with special needs.
Watch Peter Maxwell's video report:
The Full Circle Foundation, a Grosse Pointe Park-based nonprofit, uses the garden and a partnering 4-H chicken coop to teach young adults with special needs life skills, job skills, and social experiences.
"We provide the programming and the life skills, job skills, social experiences. They're the ones that really make our days fun," Director of Operations Stephanie DiVirgil said.
DiVirgil said the thieves hit both the foundation's edible garden and the Ribbions Club 4-H partners' chicken coop not once, but twice over the holiday weekend.
"It's just so unnecessary, and it's so sad to do," DiVirgil said.
According to Ribbion Farms 4-H Club, 22 out of 26 chickens are missing, along with 2 geese. Volunteers also believe thieves — not predatory animals — took a hen that had just laid fresh eggs. They believe the thieves climbed over a fence and peeled back the enclosure to the coop.
4-H Officer and Executive Officer Madison Chetham said the discovery left volunteers searching and confused.
"We were very confused. We were looking. We thought maybe they had been lost, like they had run away into like back woods back there. We were looking and couldn't find them," Chetham said.
The missing birds are not ordinary backyard chickens. They are prized show chickens raised through the 4-H program and used to teach young adults with special needs responsibility, animal care, and job skills. In 2025, Chetham took home the best-looking rooster in Wayne County at the Wayne County Fair.
"With our chickens being gone, we can't work with them. We can't, you know, obviously you can study, you can work, but without the chickens, what are you going to do?" Chetham said.
Chetham said she is worried about the safety of the stolen animals.
"I don't know why. Obviously, we're not in their heads. I don't know if they're doing it for money or they just want chickens and geese or anything like that, but I doubt they know how to take care of them, and I am just worried for the safety of the birds," Chetham said.
Her mother, 4-H Volunteer Megan Jolly, is asking whoever took the animals to bring them back.
"There's a lot of time, effort, and love that have gone into these chickens. Please return them," Jolly said.
Volunteers are now asking the community for help identifying who is responsible.
"I am very upset," Chetham said.
"It's very, very unfortunate," DiVirgil said.
4-H Volunteer Tom Peelle called the theft disheartening.
"It's disheartening," Peelle said.
A police report has been filed with Detroit Police.
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