Seeing that the air purifier was stuck, the recycler was shocked when he removed it to check

At about 8 pm on May 14, 2022, a man surnamed Lin and the owner of his recycling warehouse went to the police station of Tam Hap area, in New Taipei City, Taiwan. Mr. Lin carried a plastic bag containing a lot of cash.

Mr. Lin told police that he found the large sum of money while testing an old air purifier at his workplace, a recycling facility. Mr. Lin was about to repair the air purifier to see if it was still usable when he noticed that the machine made a strange noise. Mr. Lin decided to take the machine apart to check, and discovered that there were 2 paper wrappers inside. When he opened it, he found the inside was full of cash.

A total of NT$2 million (more than VND 1.5 billion) was found in the old air purifier by Mr. Lin. However, instead of taking the money for himself, Mr. Lin made the decision to return the money to its true owner. Therefore, Mr. Lin and his owner went to the police station to report the incident.

Police chief Chuang Yupei said investigators quickly checked the footage from security cameras around the area. As a result, they found a small blue cargo van that had carried a pile of discarded wood and an old air purifier to a recycling depot. Within two hours, police found the owner of the money, Mr. Chen, 70. Mr. Chen received the news and immediately went to the police station to get the money back.

According to Mr. Chen, that day, the public house was doing renovations, so he took the old air purifier to the recycling warehouse, asking the staff to check if it was still working. That air purifier is over 40 years old and hasn’t been used for a long time. Mr. Chen himself can’t remember how and when he hid the money inside this air purifier. Mr. Chen was also deeply moved and grateful for Mr. Lin’s act of kindness.

Reportedly, the police confirmed that Mr. Chen was indeed the owner of the money by comparing Mr. Chen’s handwriting with the handwriting on the paper bag containing the money.

Police chief Chuang Yupei said this was the first time she had met someone who had found such a large sum of money, adding that Mr. Lin had lost sleep and was worried until the money was returned properly. safe.