Struggling Waitress Can Keep $12,000 Tip

[The Straight Story]

Police in Moorhead, Minnesota, will return a $12,000 tip they seized from a struggling local waitress, her attorney said on Thursday.

Stacy Knutson, a server at the Fryn' Pan Restaurant in Moorhead, got the tip back in November from a customer who left a takeout box inside the restaurant.

Knutson followed the customer out to parking lot and tried to give her the box but the woman told her to keep it. When Knutson opened it, she found $12,000 in cash.

Knutson, a mother of five, called local police and turned in the cash as lost property.

At first, police said the cash would be hers if it remained unclaimed for 60 days, according to the lawsuit Knutson filed against the department.

...

Then police told her she would not receive the money at all because it smelled of marijuana and had been seized under a state law.

http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2012/04/06/Struggling-Waitress-Can-Keep-12000-Tip.aspx#page1

[niyad]

1. okay--I just made the mistake of reading the comments--the ones at the bottome were disgusting.

[NaturalHigh]

2. Pretty crappy of the cops to try to keep it in the first place.

I wonder what plans they had for it.

[niyad]

3. if the money indeed "smelled of marijuana"--why was that not stated when she first turned in

the money? I hope someone calls for an investigation of that lovely police force--sounds like some unsavoury people are working there.