Mid semester, D was doing wash in the dorm washing machine at night. She went to get her wet clothes out to put them in the dryer. To her surprise she found a wet wad of bills at the bottom of the washer. The total of amount of money was significant (more than $500). D called us and asked: what should I do? Frankly her first instinct was to think that this was somehow drug related and to leave it there and pretend she never saw it. We told D to alert either the RA or campus security. She ended up calling campus security, going to their office and turning the money in to 2 security officers that night. She gave a written statement about what happened but did not get a receipt. They told her not to tell her specific RA to avoid a fake claim for the money, so she said nothing to the RA or any fellow students. They said they would send out an email to the student population saying a sum of money had been found but not specifying where, and the claimant should come forward and say how much it was and where it was lost. One officer remarked that if no one claimed it, maybe she would end up with it. But D never saw any email about the money. They also told her the director of campus security would contact her but he never did.
Before the semester ended D tried a couple times to follow up in person with campus security. The original 2 were never there when she went by, and the person on duty both times claimed to know nothing about this and implied she was foolish for thinking she might eventually have a claim to the money. The director was never there.
The semester has now ended. Furthermore, D was on a domestic exchange so after break she goes back to her home college, not the place where this occurred. At this point, WWYD? I feel that she should follow up with at least an email to the director of campus security describing what happened and asking about the outcome. She’d certainly be perfectly happy if she found out the rightful claimant ended up with the money. Should she forget about it and be satisfied that she did the right thing and won’t know what happened, or follow up more? What makes me suspicious about this is the absence of the promised email to the student population asking for a claimant to come forward.
Sounds like those two security guards pocketed it. Probably not a lot to be done this late in the game. In hindsight, she should have followed up a day or two later when an all campus email was not sent.
Personally I would not have advised my kid to go to the campus security or the RA with the money. I would have told her to put it in a safe place and wait and see if anyone mentioned losing it, or maybe posted a note about it. At this point there is no way the money is ever getting back into the hands of the person who lost it, or your daughter. Sounds like dishonest security officers got a little windfall that day. I don’t know how you would prove any of this. I would like to think some poor schmuck lost their pizza/beer money for the month and that it wasn’t ill gotten funds from some illegal activity.
We definitely told her to get a receipt, but being a young person she deferred to the authority figures. The saddest part of this is that we told her to do the right thing but she ends up feeling kind of like a sucker. As you say, a good lesson for the future but sort of a sad one too.
Maybe the money was returned to the rightful owner without the email. Maybe the owner contacted security and it was resolved. Or maybe not. I think she did the right thing and you just need to move on.
My daughter recently found a sum of money in a store (too large to not be a big loss to the person who dropped it). She gave it to the manager on duty and maybe the person who lost it figured out it was dropped in the store and got it back. Or maybe not. Again, she did the right thing and moved on.
I have found expensive iphones or jewelry a couple of times and gave it to the manager/person in charge. Maybe the owner claimed it and got it back. Or maybe not. Again, I did the right thing and moved on.
The moral of the story is you behave morally and just hope that other people do also.
The worst thing to do would have been to keep it and say nothing. If it is proceeds of a crime, the perpetrator may come after you. If it is innocent proceeds you could be wrongly accused of theft. As the posters said, turn it in and move on.
I’d email the head of campus security. They should know if they have dishonest employees. Or maybe someone went to them and claimed it before the email went out. I wouldn’t talk about getting the money, just explain what happened and ask for a response on what happened to the money.
I too have found iphones, wallets and money in parking lots and turned them in to the store or school with no thought of finding out whether they made it back to the rightful owner. This just seems fishy because of the combination of them telling her to keep quiet about it, promising to send out a campus wide email that she would’ve been included on, and promising a follow up that never happened. My instinct is to go with the approach of @intparent.
Personally if it were my son in this situation I would not advise him to report the matter to the head of campus security, unless he were about to graduate and leave campus. If these two security officers were dishonest and were reprimanded or lost their jobs, they would know exactly who was responsible for it and I would be afraid that they would know how to make life hard for my kid. Hopefully that would not be the case (either the corruption or the blowback on my kid for whistleblowing) but I would not take the chance over an anonymous wad of cash.
If I find something valuable I turn it in to lost and found and I move on. It would never occur to me to follow up with a business or the police or campus security to find out if they did their jobs after I turned in the item, even if the representative may not have done what they said they would do.
Boy, I wouldn’t worry about repercussions from them. If they get fired, so be it. Camp Sec has little impact on students - it isn’t like they can dock a kid’s grades or something. If people don’t speak up about graft or dishonest behavior, it doesn’t get caught or fixed. I would not be afraid of them.
I wouldn’t worry so much about getting the money. My concern would be having dishonest SECURITY PEOPLE working at my kid’s school. I would report it to the head of security and also student affairs (dean of students) or RA.
Your daughter did the right thing by turning the money in. If she feels there was possible dishonesty…she should report it as @oldfort stated. But really…at this point…it’s going to be her word against the security folks who just might say “what money?”
It’s entirely possible the person who lost it called security right away and got their money back soon after. It could have all been over the same day with no email needing to be sent. I would leave it alone from here.
It might be a little late for this instance, but I would tell my kiddo to turn the money into security and then put a message in the laundry room saying that money had been found and turned in to security. Student’s conscience is clear and the student who lost a significant amount of money would know that someone turned it in, therefore if they went to the security to claim it, they can’t be told no one turned it in.
I would go ask the head of Security what the protocol is for what happens to money turned in.
At my work, I found some money in the bathroom. I left a note saying “I found something and if it is yours go to security”. I turned the money into the security office. Nobody claimed it, and after 6 months (their protocol) the money was given to me.
Your daughter did absolutely the right thing… but have her see what the rules/ protocol are about turned in money. Have her ask if the money was noted. If it wasnt, then have her follow up on how procedures are being followed.