The incredible story of a Burnham-On-Sea couple who accidentally threw away £15,000 in cash after clearing a deceased relative’s house – and then received a surprise Christmas present after staff at a recycling centre found the money and returned it to them – has gone global.
As Burnham-On-Sea.com first reported last week, the couple had taken several boxes of rubbish from their relative’s house to the recycling centre in Midsomer Norton without knowing that the substantial sum of money was tucked inside.
Fortunately, staff at the site stumbled upon the box with the cash inside while they were looking for an electrical cable.
The staff alerted Avon and Somerset Police, who managed to track down the owners using CCTV footage at the recycling centre.
The good deed has been published in newspapers around the world, including The New York Times, The Times of India and Australia’s Telegraph, in addition to being featured in radio and TV news bulletins.
Police identified the car that had been used by the couple to drop off the recycling and then traced their address to Burnham-On-Sea.
When Police went to speak to them, the couple from Burnham said they had been in the Bath area helping clear the house of a recently-deceased relative when the boxes had been dropped off.
Police say the couple went to Radstock Police Station where their account matched the property found. They added that the relative had been known to hide money in strange places around the house.
The money was returned to the couple and police paid tribute to the staff that had found the cash and had assisted in tracking down the couple.
An Avon and Somerset Police spokesman said: “We would like to say a big thank you to the staff at the recycling centre.”
“Without their diligent attitude, integrity and assistance, the family would never have known about the money found, and we would not have been able to return it to them, especially in time for Christmas.”
