12-year-old fighting cancer gets puppy, plenty of police support at lemonade stand

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Brooklyn Shorter, a 12-year-old battling cancer, received lots of police support at her lemonade stand.
• Diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer, Brooklyn's tumor reduced by 45.1% over 13 months.
• Brooklyn had the goal of raising funds for a puppy.

CEDAR CITY — When Josh Carver walked up to 12-year-old Brooklyn Shorter's lemonade stand in Cedar City, he wasn't prepared for what he was about to encounter.

There wasn't a big sign or any other customers. All Carver knew was that the girl he was about to buy lemonade from had cancer.

"There was a gal here in town who is a friend of the family, and she texted me and said that if I was out there, there was this little girl who had a lemonade stand and was battling cancer, and she was trying to raise money," Carver recalled.

Carver is a K-9 officer with the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources. Brooklyn told her mom that she had a goal of having a police officer buy some lemonade, who then told a friend. Brooklyn had also set a goal to raise enough money to buy a puppy.

"I wasn't working, so I decided to swing by as soon as I got a chance," Carver said. "It was the most humble lemonade stand I had ever seen. I did the same thing as every officer would do. It was nothing special. I had cash saved to give to someone in need, and I gave her what I had."

When Carver walked away that day, he said he wasn't prepared for how that interaction would affect him because it hit close to home.

"Knowing what my kids went through when my son was doing chemo and my daughter was in the hospital with her autoimmune disease, I knew I had to help," Carver said. "I know that it doesn't matter what this family says, money is important in the sense that it gives them freedom to be with their child."

In February 2025, Brooklyn was diagnosed with Stage 4 diffuse midline glioma, which is a highly aggressive cancerous brain tumor. With it being stage 4, this meant she was terminal, and the doctors gave Brooklyn nine months to live.

"They told us there wasn't anything they could do," said Brooklyn's dad, Steven Shorter. "She had a device put in her head called a shunt that drains the excess pressure from her brain, and it was going into her stomach. She then had complications with that."

Brooklyn went on to have more complications during the next few months, including the plastic tubing from her shunt wrapping around her heart. She has also undergone 15 rounds of radiation, and due to complications with earlier treatments, her parents have opted for a more holistic approach.

According to Brooklyn's parents, testing has shown no new cancer growth, and there has been a 45.1% reduction in the size of her brain tumor.

"Yes, that 0.1% does matter," Steven Shorter said. "Brooklyn's oncologist said the tumor is dying deeper than they've seen before. ... Her midline shift (pressure in the brain) went from a 10 to a 1. It then went from 1 to a 0. It corrected itself without surgical intervention."

Brooklyn will go in for her 13-month cancer screening next week, and her parents said that they are hopeful, while still aware that by medical standards, they are living on borrowed time. Carver said he understands that all too well.

"My daughter was the same age as Brooklyn when she was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease," Carver said. "We've been prepped by doctors a couple of times saying that she won't make it. That's not easy. On top of that, when my son came home from his (Church of Jesus Christ) mission, he was diagnosed with cancer.

"Every day is a blessing. Every day they get to have with her is one more day. The elephant in the room is that these things can end badly."

Brooklyn's parents said that their daughter is a prime example of someone who wants to live life to the fullest. In fact, the lemonade stand is something that Brooklyn started doing even before her diagnosis because she likes doing them.

"For quite a while, she and her friends would do them in the summertime and have hot chocolate stands in winter," Steven Shorter said. "She just kept doing it, and she did it by herself. If she wants to buy something, she'll say, 'I'm going to do some lemonade stands.'"

This time, Brooklyn had the goal of buying a puppy, with the little hope that a police officer would stop by. A couple of days after Carver stopped by, she was met with far more than she had hoped for.

"The next thing we know, pretty much every law enforcement agency in Utah was there," Steven Shorter said. "They did another event for her yesterday (March 12) where they brought the SWAT team."

And, of course, along with all those visitors came another one who gets to stay awhile.

"A girl with the puppy came walking up, and said, 'Do you wanna hold the puppy?' and then she whispered, 'Do you wanna keep the puppy?'" Brooklyn recalled. "I was super excited and happy. I was so surprised. I was like, 'Look, there's a puppy!' I didn't even know it was my puppy."

Carver said that there wasn't a dry eye there, and he said that he and other local law enforcement agencies have a goal to continue to get help for Brooklyn and her family.

"When I saw her, I recognized all the same signs of what my son and daughter went through, and the law enforcement community has helped my family so much," Carver said. "I decided to text troopers from surrounding departments, many whose hearts are bigger than their brains. I can't tell you how fast they responded. Lt. Shawn Peterson from Iron County Sheriff got the ball rolling on his end.

"The Pollock family here locally donated the dog. I know we have other things in the works, and I hope she raised money (doing her lemonade stand), and I would like her to raise a lot more money."

A GoFundMe* fundraiser was also created to help Brooklyn in her cancer journey.

*KSL.com does not assure that the money deposited to the account will be applied for the benefit of the persons named as beneficiaries. If you are considering a deposit to the account, you should consult your own advisers and otherwise proceed at your own risk.

Photos

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.

Related topics

FeaturesUtahSouthern UtahPolice & CourtsUplifting

Arianne Brown

• 

Arianne Brown is a reporter covering southern Utah communities, with a focus on heart-warming stories and local happenings. She has been a reporter for 14 years.