Soccer raffle benefits slain Cd'A officer
<p>Alex Liddiard,11, left, and Tyler Gasper, 11, gather in Pick 6 Sports Cards in Coeur d’Alene Wednesday with a Seattle Sounders soccer ball autographed by player Clint Dempsey. Tyler gave up his prized possession soccer ball to be raffled off as a way to raise money for the Moore family, and Alex was the winner of the raffle prize. (KRISTEN McPEEK/Hagadone News Network)</p>
A young Sting soccer player sacrificed his most prized possession to help the family of a fellow player.
Tyler Gasper, 11, volunteered his soccer ball — signed by Clint Dempsey of the Seattle Sounders — to be raffled off to raise money for the family of Coeur d’Alene Police Sgt. Greg Moore.
Moore was shot and killed in the line of duty on May 5, a week before the Hot Shot Soccer tournament hosted each year by the Sting soccer club. Moore’s 12-year-old son, Dylon Moore, is a Coeur d’Alene Sting player.
“What a really moving and heartfelt gesture… It was such a selfless act on the part of this young man,” said Sagle resident Mary Fraser, whose son, Alex Liddiard, 11, purchased the winning ticket.
Fraser’s son played in the tournament, and received a call about a week later that he had won the ball. When Fraser spoke to Tyler’s father, Tom Gasper, she learned that Tyler was “a huge Clint Dempsey fan.”
She said she was struck by Tyler’s generosity, and said most 11-year-olds wouldn’t be willing to give up something so special to them.
Tom Gasper said his son was at soccer camp last summer when the boy met his idol. Tyler had his photo taken with Dempsey and received the signed soccer ball.
Following Moore’s death, Sting soccer club began fundraising on behalf of the officer’s family. Gasper — who owns Pick 6 Sportscards, a sports memorabilia store in Coeur d’Alene — donated a ball from his store for a raffle. Gasper said when Tyler, a fifth-grade student at Hayden Meadows Elementary School, heard about the raffle, he went and got his autographed ball and set it on his father’s dresser.
“He thought that it would be a great idea, so he donated his ball,” Gasper said.
Being a retired police officer from Las Vegas and a sports shop owner, Gasper said he thought the raffle of the soccer balls would be a great way to help. His 13-year-old son, Brody, helped as well by manning the booth where the raffle tickets were sold.
“I think both my boys did a really good thing,” Gasper said. “It was great to see the community rallying around it, trying to help out the Moore family as much as they could.”