Triumphrat

Tbirdnz · 07-23-2007

Interesting, so what would you do ?

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/...ectid=10453433

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Ride on !

LoVel · 07-23-2007

leave it lay and let someone else steal it or return it.

HiDesert · 07-23-2007

Right now? Hawk it and put the money in the bike fund!

I'm kidding, of course; I'd return it. Unless I was in a huge hurry, in which case I might let it lay.

LoVel · 07-23-2007

This very situation happened to me over the weekend and I just kept walking. To me it actually looked like it was left there just to see if some one would pick it up. If I had felt like someone honestly lost it I would have grabbed it and made sure it got back to the owner.

I have seen wallets left laying with a string tied to them to try and play a joke on someone and I did grab a bunch of money blowing all over a parking lot. Sadly there was a wallet nearby that had a name and address. I returned the $300 I managed to gather up.

Tbirdnz · 07-23-2007

I actually didn't indicate what I would do myself. If it was in a public area and there was a copper nearby I would alert him to it.

I'm a bit like Lovel, would be wary of picking up something like that in the city, if it was just lying in the countryside as if it had been dropped and lost. I'd just drop it into the nearest cop shop. I've found wallets in supermarkets and handed them into the counter. If I was going to be a thief it would have to be at least a million bucks, every guy has his price !

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Ride on !

p.s. if anyone gets as far as reading page 2 of that link it's interesting about other cities and other objects left around.

BadMouth · 07-23-2007

I always contact the rightful owner myself. I don't trust employees or police with cash, even if it's not mine.

I once found a wallet with $60 in it and turned it over to the campus cops (not penn state btw). I met the person who had lost it about a week later and he said that it was empty when they gave it back to him.

miker · 07-24-2007

This was covered in our morning news today as well.

The general consensus from this morning's discussion was that the reason the people who don't give property back is because of their so called "busy" selfish lifestyle. They think it might be a hassle to return it, therefore causing them inconvenience. Those who were honest were usually those with more time to consider the implications of how the owner might have felt. All this goes hand in hand with the society they live in. Smaller cities and towns had more of a sense of community, larger cities create anonymity, therfore making the finder feel less responsible for other people's property. Others thought that if they did the right thing, the Karma would come back to them, so even if they did give it back, it wasn't for anything more than selfish reasons.

Personally I'd try and find the owner, usually there's a home number, or an ICE (In Case of Emergency) number in the phone. Same with wallets, or anything else - Give it back, personally. Handing it to the police if you can't track the owner in a suitable time frame.

Mick

DaveB · 07-25-2007

Is it OK for me to joke about the place I live in? I reckon there'd be no point in trying this in Joburg because the result can be predicted with total accuracy. If someone distributed 30 cellphones around town they'd end up losing 31. Anybody walking around the city's parks, placing things on benches, would get mugged and their own phone would be taken too.

BTW I really do like this city but you've really got to look after your property.

DaveB.

ruscook · 07-25-2007

A mate and I were travelling by bike up to Karumba, Cairns and back TO Sydney (8000k in 14 days) about 4 years ago. We found a phone at a roundabout (yep in the road) in Mackay, Qld.

I was looking for an optometrist to fix my glasses. We rang the last call on the number and got in touch with the owner. We left the phone at the local optometrist for the owner to pick up.

We did a good deed, it didn't cost us all day, the owner got their phone, the local optometrist got some brownie points as well, everyone wins

Russ

MVP44 · 07-25-2007

Think Miker hit it. Most people just don't want to be bothered with the hassle of locating the owner - shame really, when schedules dictate character.

Lost my cell phone once - called the number and a lady picked up and said she had been waiting for me to call. Nice when you are able to meet someone with strong character - we are so bombarded with the neg side of life in the media we need some positive boost every now and then.