Stranger returns backpack containing nearly $18K, but feds try to forfeit the cash
Authorities had good news and bad news for an Amtrak passenger whose backpack went missing at a Washington, D.C., train station last March.
The good news: The stranger who accidentally picked the backpack up at Union Station, mistaking it for his own, returned it, along with $17,900 in cash he found inside.
The bad news: The feds are trying to forfeit the cash, claiming it is drug money, reports the Washington Post (reg. req.), based on filings in a case in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
The passenger who lost the backpack says the money wasn’t his, but his mother is contending that the $17,900 belongs to her and her partner and trying to get the cash back.
The two women say they got the money by selling two mink coats and saving cash from a tax refund, intending to buy a car, the article explains. Then, says the Amtrak passenger’s mom, she stashed the cash in her son’s backpack during a visit to North Carolina, when she suddenly had to return to New York for surgery, but she didn’t tell him about it. She told him to bring the backpack with him on a trip to New York via Washington, but again, she didn’t mention the cash stash.
The feds contend the backpack is related to drug activity, alleging that a police dog alerted them of the presence of narcotics residue when it was placed among other backpacks. The passenger and his mom’s partner both have a record of drug-related convictions.
