‘I felt like such a schmuck’: Spike recalls finding $4.3K in a briefcase as Albany PD hunts a man over $30

The Albany Police Department in Georgia drew national attention and widespread ridicule after posting a surveillance photo on Facebook asking the public to help identify a man who picked up $30 off the floor of a local Walmart and kept it.

The man eventually returned the money, and the person who lost it initially wanted to press charges but changed their mind after getting the cash back.

Jake Skorheim and Spike O’Neill, co-hosts of “The Jake and Spike Show” on KIRO Newsradio, had mixed feelings about the incident, and Spike shared a similar story from his past.

Jake says a simple conversation would’ve been enough

Jake said he understood the impulse to track the man down but questioned whether a public manhunt over $30 was a good use of the Albany Police Department’s time.

“I would think that may not rise to the level of the Albany Police Department chasing this guy down,” Jake said. “I hope when they find him, they just say, like, ‘Hey sir, did you know that wasn’t your money?’ I don’t know if he needs jail time for this.

“We want people punished for doing bad things. I don’t think anybody is, I mean, I’m sure there are some crazy people out there who just want people to run amok,” Jake added. “We are not those crazy people. This, to me, though, seems like everything is just perfect in Albany that they can do this?”

Spike recalls finding a briefcase with $4,300 in the street

The story triggered a memory for Spike, who said that as a 21-year-old living in his parents’ basement in the early 1980s, he found a briefcase in the street of his townhome cul-de-sac with $4,300 inside.

“What’s $4,300 to a 21-year-old? That’s a hundred grand to a 21-year-old. That’s all the taters,” Spike said. “It was going to open up a lot of doors and solve a lot of problems for me.”

Jake immediately grasped the stakes.

“You were going to have the summer of your life,” he said.

“There goes my summer rent right there. 100%,” Spike said. “There goes all the party money I would ever possibly need. Turning down shifts all summer long cause I didn’t need the money.”

But that afternoon, a man knocked on the door. He ran a small restaurant, had apparently left the briefcase on top of his car, and was nearly in tears when Spike handed it back.

“I felt like such a schmuck,” Spike said. “Not for giving it back cause my buddies were like, ‘Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare.’ The girl I was dating was like, ‘You cannot seriously be thinking about…’ And literally that afternoon came a knock on our door.”

Jake said the story captured something bigger.

“What’s the price of your character?” Jake said. “You’re going to remember that the rest of your life that you gave that money back. And you would’ve remembered on the other side if you had not given it back. That would’ve haunted you for the rest of your life.”

“It does paint you,” Spike said. “It really does. It paints who you are, how you see the world.”

Watch the full discussion in the video above.

Listen to “The Jake and Spike Show” weekdays from noon to 3 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio 97.3