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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Finders keepers?

243 replies

AldiBag4Life · 30/04/2023 21:31

My DD18 told me last week she found an item of jewellery in a grass verge randomly one day when she was out walking to work - 6 months ago.

I recently complemented her wearing it and asked about it - she told me she found it and said she assumed it was just junk jewellery, but it turns out from my research when I looked at it the markings, it’s worth quite a lot of money.

It has no personal inscription on it (its not a ring) and I haven’t seen a post on our local group from anyone who has lost anything although I did tell her she could put a post up and if anyone described it then she should give it back.

She hasn’t put a post up and she is planning on keeping it, not cos it’s worth money she just likes it, she isn’t selling it.

I’m kind of feeling weird about it because it might be sentimental to someone. WWYD?

OP posts:
Shakespeareandi · 01/05/2023 08:45

Not a great attitude from your daughter. She is 18 and shoukd knwk better. But, great opportunity to learn now. Pop it on local fb pages and contact police. The feeling of having returned something to the owner is great and a much better feeling than wearing something which is not rightfully yours. It's a great feeling doing the right thing! And if you believe in karma or not, if everyone just tried to do good things to others the world would look so much better.
It's only more jewellery to your daughter, sounds like she has enough, so try to return it to the owner.

Bananarama77 · 01/05/2023 08:51

My DM found a piece of jewellery a couple of years ago & found it was more than costume jewellery. She reported it to police & they told her to stick it on SM & ask around but they said if she took it to them they would just keep it until someone claimed it so she was better off trying to find the owner as they won’t actively search & it will just end up in a police auction. So she did & the owner was never found, she still has it now & wears it. Don’t worry about all these harsh comments about what a thief she is, the police do nothing to locate the owner anyway so if your DD finds the owner great if not then finders keepers

GabriellaMontez · 01/05/2023 08:51

Contact the police??!!!

Have people here tried to contact the police lately? Expect to be in a long phone queue to report a real crime. Then expect nothing.

Gridhopper · 01/05/2023 08:52

The irony of posters taking the moral high ground whilst also telling the OP her daughter is sneaky, immoral, unfeeling, and that she’s failed as a parent and should be thoroughly ashamed of herself and her daughter.

Of course it’s reasonable to say that she should have a stab at finding the owner, but anyone slinging the above insults around is engaging in far worse behaviour than the daughter has. If a friend had asked you the same question as the OP would you have answered in the same way? I guess these extreme posters would cut all ties with a friend whose child had been caught e.g. shoplifting - after raining down their wrath.

MrBit · 01/05/2023 08:53

She's 18. She's an adult. Of course she knows what she should have done she just didn't want to
I hope you can make her see sense @AldiBag4Life
Value isn't just measured in money

LightDrizzle · 01/05/2023 08:55

ChairFloorWall · 01/05/2023 06:18

I think this is a bit OTT ffs. She’s obviously just thought it was a crap piece of jewellery not worth much, she’s not picked it up and taken it because she knows it’ll cause someone distress 🙄

Show quote history

She certainly knows now that it’s not a piece of crap jewellery and it’s not all about value. I wear a cream bangle I wouldn’t choose out of a shop if it was reduced to 2p but I wear it almost daily because my mum had done since her sister bought it for her in the 70s and it was on her wrist when she died with me bedside. Jewellery is such a common item to have sentimentality attached, it’s the go to significant birthday/ wedding/ birth of child/ gift and a very common thing to be specifically bequeathed to people.

Empathy because it’s something children generally have to learn and parents and schools put a lot effort into it from them being small, all that “How would you feel if Chloe wouldn’t give you your gel pen back?” OP’s daughter is a legal adult now and if I were her mum, I’d be more worried by the fact that the feelings of the owner hadn’t occurred to her than by the technical criminality.

I’ve been lucky enough to regain things I’ve dropped or left behind because decent people have handed them in. Of course I would do the same.

Batalax · 01/05/2023 08:56

I found a wad of cash, handed it in to the police station and was allowed to keep it when it wasn’t claimed.
I had a pang when I handed it in, knowing I could just easily spend it, but I couldn’t have that on my conscience.

luckylavender · 01/05/2023 08:57

Keyan · 30/04/2023 22:19

I don't see anything wrong with this?? If you find something on the floor in public and nobody is around looking for it then it is okay IMO to have it.

Another strange take

GoodChat · 01/05/2023 08:58

GabriellaMontez · 01/05/2023 08:51

Contact the police??!!!

Have people here tried to contact the police lately? Expect to be in a long phone queue to report a real crime. Then expect nothing.

If they've had a missing item reported they'd be happy to reunite the owner.

Mortimercat · 01/05/2023 08:59

Gridhopper · 01/05/2023 08:52

The irony of posters taking the moral high ground whilst also telling the OP her daughter is sneaky, immoral, unfeeling, and that she’s failed as a parent and should be thoroughly ashamed of herself and her daughter.

Of course it’s reasonable to say that she should have a stab at finding the owner, but anyone slinging the above insults around is engaging in far worse behaviour than the daughter has. If a friend had asked you the same question as the OP would you have answered in the same way? I guess these extreme posters would cut all ties with a friend whose child had been caught e.g. shoplifting - after raining down their wrath.

You think that criticising somebody for stealing is worse than stealing? Right. I think you are trying to take some moral high ground but your argument makes no sense.

BreatheAndFocus · 01/05/2023 09:03

Eh? Of course it’s not finders keepers! You find something, you take it to the police/report it, etc. it’s not hers and all that stuff about cheap jewellery sounds like an excuse, frankly. You don’t take things that aren’t yours even if there’s no owner nearby. It’s theft - and totally thoughtless.

Appleass · 01/05/2023 09:03

Morally she should try locate owner, power of social media, no details of jeweller, ask loser to describe, not police, they don't record found property, unless high value, ie, not a couple of thousands pounds worth and yes theft by finding is real offence.

OddSockSeeker · 01/05/2023 09:07

You don’t take what’s not yours.
She’s being dishonest. Makes me sad people like this exist. Wouldn’t take two mins to report to the police or put up a post. Total lack of empathy.

Karma

ItsBritneyBitchhhh · 01/05/2023 09:09

SleepingStandingUp · 01/05/2023 06:42

She needs to get help to find the owner? Like a private detective??

Show quote history

Literally😂😂 I have to unfollow this thread now because the comments are so ridiculous it’s unreal

loislovesstewie · 01/05/2023 09:16

As I understand it, as long as she has made a reasonable attempt to find the owner then she would not be guilty of theft by finding. Putting it on Facebook for the local area would quite probably be doing enough. And at 18 she ought to know that it's, at the very least, unkind to keep it without trying to find the owner.

Bananarama77 · 01/05/2023 09:19

ItsBritneyBitchhhh · 01/05/2023 09:09

Literally😂😂 I have to unfollow this thread now because the comments are so ridiculous it’s unreal

Show quote history

Me too! Glad I don’t know people like this irl

Gridhopper · 01/05/2023 09:22

@Mortimercat

No I’m saying that telling someone they’ve failed badly as a mother because their daughter kept some jewellery she found is, in my opinion, worse than the original ‘crime’. And not indicative of the kind, good and moral outlook it attempted to exemplify.

Original poster
AldiBag4Life · 01/05/2023 09:23

Ok sorry lots of responses. Thanks for mixed opinions.

We live in a small place, the nearest police station is a long way away, and DD had no idea she should have done this at the time.

like I said, she just naively assumed it was something rubbish in the grass, she said she picked it up and put it into her pocket not sure what to do with it then forgot about it. She remembered it months later and wore it, when I noticed it. When she handed it to me I realised it was heavier than I expected and not junk.

I searched our local group straight away, and couldn’t find a post, also nothing about a burglary since she found it. She is not on Facebook - I’m not sure many teens are.

I explained to her she needs to take reasonable steps to find the owner so she is going to report it to the police. She understands that now, she just hadn’t really thought of that before, perhaps that’s on me 🤷🏻‍♀️ but I can’t recall anything like this happening to me.

for those slating her, Her world is pretty small, she was a lockdown kid in her GCSE year and she’s struggled to make that move into adulthood, sometimes it’s more like she’s still 16 - working on that. I just don’t think she thought about it from another perspective. If it happened at school or work she would know what to do cos there are defined processes but this was outside of that so a new experience for her to learn from

Thanks for advice I hope we reunite it with its owner

OP posts:
GuinnessBird · 01/05/2023 09:25

The police will not be interested at all.

Original poster
AldiBag4Life · 01/05/2023 09:28

Oh ok sorry, there are so many comments I just saw that about the police. It’s white gold and I think it’s worth about £500 as it’s heavyish and gold is worth quite a lot nowadays. That’s just my assumption DD wasn’t intending to sell it. We will look into Facebook. No local shops to hand it into just grass, houses etc

OP posts:
switswooo · 01/05/2023 09:34

AldiBag4Life · 01/05/2023 09:23

Ok sorry lots of responses. Thanks for mixed opinions.

We live in a small place, the nearest police station is a long way away, and DD had no idea she should have done this at the time.

like I said, she just naively assumed it was something rubbish in the grass, she said she picked it up and put it into her pocket not sure what to do with it then forgot about it. She remembered it months later and wore it, when I noticed it. When she handed it to me I realised it was heavier than I expected and not junk.

I searched our local group straight away, and couldn’t find a post, also nothing about a burglary since she found it. She is not on Facebook - I’m not sure many teens are.

I explained to her she needs to take reasonable steps to find the owner so she is going to report it to the police. She understands that now, she just hadn’t really thought of that before, perhaps that’s on me 🤷🏻‍♀️ but I can’t recall anything like this happening to me.

for those slating her, Her world is pretty small, she was a lockdown kid in her GCSE year and she’s struggled to make that move into adulthood, sometimes it’s more like she’s still 16 - working on that. I just don’t think she thought about it from another perspective. If it happened at school or work she would know what to do cos there are defined processes but this was outside of that so a new experience for her to learn from

Thanks for advice I hope we reunite it with its owner

Don’t worry, OP, your dd is fine. As I said upthread, I wouldn’t have known to go to the police at 18 either.

Ignore the people calling her a thief and a criminal.

slowquickstep · 01/05/2023 09:36

Is this going to be the new excuse for poor behaviour " she was a lockdown kid"

FancyFanny · 01/05/2023 09:36

It's not breaking the law to keep found items. The police stopped collecting lost property several years ago- you can register an item on their searchable database but they don't take responsibility for reuniting items with their owners anymore and jewellery is not accepted as a listable item.

So the OPs daughter can keep the jewellery knowing she has not broken any laws.

Of course, if she wants to she could try finding the owner on social media but she has no obligation to do so- how can using facebook to find people cover you by law anyway- it can't be regulated? Only contacting the police could do that.

MolkosTeenageAngst · 01/05/2023 09:39

Many police stations outside of small towns and villages don’t take in lost property. I lost my bag with purse and house keys in central Manchester and the police weren’t interested, they said they don’t take in found items and they wouldn’t take in a missing item report either. They said it was on me to knock on doors, put up posters or post on social media to try and find it and were no help at all.