$98,000 cash found in desk bought on Craigslist

[haikuman]

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/oddnews/98-0....html?vp=1

New Haven, Connecticut Rabbi Noah Muroff bought a desk he found listed on Craigslist and ended up discovering a bag filled $98,000 cash stuffed inside the purchase. Rabbi Noah told WTNH News 8 that when he got the piece of office furniture home, "The desk didn’t fit into this office by fraction of an inch.” He and his wife attempted to take the hinges off his office door, but that didn’t help. So they unscrewed the desktop and noticed something unusual. "Behind the drawers there is this plastic bag, like a shopping, I’m talking about. And in that bag, I could already see through the bag, there’s it looks like a hundred dollar bill,” said Rabbi Noah. He continued, "We open it up and it's full of cash. We count it up and there's $98,000 cash sitting in the bag…Right away my wife and I sort of you know looked at each other and said, ‘We can't keep this money.’"

[Ombligo]

Interesting ethical delimma..

Your first instinct is like the Rabbi's - return it the owner.

But who is the owner? The person who previously had the desk was obviously unaware it was there. Perhaps they never even knew. Perhaps they received the desk from someone else? Regardless they seemed to have not been concerned. So returning it to them is not necessarily returning the money to it's rightful owner as that person may have no more claim than the Rabbi.

Keep it? you bought it, no matter how unintentional. Technically you are the rightful owner now. But that really doesn't seem right.

Give it to charity? Here it would do the most good, but is it yours to give? that takes the question full circle.

It could be a fun question in an ethics class.

[space-time]

while you think about these difficult choices, you better invest this in a savings account or money market to get some interest. Then think about it.

[RAMd®d]

as that person may have no more less claim than the Rabbi.


If I were to keep it, I'd leave it in the desk.

It would be cash spending money on small to medium items, groceries, no big purchases. No bank, no interest, no taxes.

The other consideration is where that money originally came from. If the money is from ill-gotten gains, the serial numbers *might* get flagged.

THAT'S a dilemma!

[haikuman]

The equation is rather simple
$98,000 ÷ Hookers and Booze

phffft ~!~

[mrlynn]

You can bet that with the publicity, the seller on CL will claim the money is his. Unless, of course, as RAMd®d suggests, it's "ill-gotten." I would suggest waiting a reasonable period of time, and if no one comes forth with a plausible claim to the money (e.g. "It was my late uncle's desk, and the $98k is in his accounts ledger—see?"), it's yours.

/Mr Lynn

[Will Collier]

I found about $20 worth of quarters in a couple of broken arcade games that I bought for $5... that was a pretty good day.

Both games were repairable, probably put all of $75 into both of them.

[cbelt3]

Generally when you buy a thing, you buy the contents as well. Certain exceptions apply to legal documents or classified documents (there have been cases of surpus military furniture sold with classified documents still in them).

Ethically ? Being a Rabbi, he had no choice. Although accepting it as a gift from God for the Temple would have been kind of cool.

[Acer]

RAMd®d wrote:
as that person may have no more less claim than the Rabbi.


If I were to keep it, I'd leave it in the desk.

It would be cash spending money on small to medium items, groceries, no big purchases. No bank, no interest, no taxes.

The other consideration is where that money originally came from. If the money is from ill-gotten gains, the serial numbers *might* get flagged.

THAT'S a dilemma!

Yup, that's the dilemma. Or what if the "rightful" "owners" "send" their "boys" over to "inquire" about the "lost" "item." IYNWIM. This is why I am content not to find money in a bag on the street. Who needs the stress?

[mikebw]

Go to a bank with a black ski mask on your face and demand they take the money!