A California woman is pleading for the return of a pair of $18,000 diamond earrings, hidden for safe-keeping in the pocket of a denim jacket that she accidentally sold at a garage sale — for 20 bucks.
Someone got a real deal when they paid $20 for Dori Rhoades’ jacket — hidden in the pocket were the earrings, $1,500 in cash the family was saving for vacation, and a ring.
Rhoades originally tucked the items away to keep them safe in case of burglars, she told CBS Los Angeles.
What she couldn’t do was protect them from her own forgetfulness. Late in getting things together for the garage sale, Rhoades told CBS Los Angeles that she threw the jacket into the sale pile.
“I think anyone who is a mother knows. You give so much of yourself that sometimes your brain stops working,” she said.
The Huntington Beach woman is hoping the person who bought the jacket will see news reports and do the kind thing by returning the earrings and cash.
It’s happened before.
A man who put what he thought was an
empty jewelry box in a neighborhood sale found out, to his horror, that the box contained his wife’s $23K wedding ring.
While his wife was in the hospital Eric Kloutier rushed home to get some things together to participate in the sale. He had no idea his wife had stashed her wedding ring in the box when her fingers swelled during pregnancy.
The couple put the story out to the media and proof that good-hearted people still exist came quickly. Andrew and Alyssa Lossau, who were given the box by Alyssa’s mother,
saw the reports and turned the ring over, ABC News reported.
Stories of honesty abound when it comes to missing jewels.
A story in the Daily Mail tells of sewage workers in 2012 in Idaho who noticed a ring, only realizing when they cleaned it off that it was a diamond. They turned it in to city hall, and the owner was eventually found.
Related stories:
Putin Stole Super Bowl Ring? Kremlin Dismisses Patriots Owner's Claim
Diamond Ring Put in Salvation Army Kettle in Florida