West Virginia = Low Crime and Good Samaritans
Looking for a place with the finest people in the world? It's great here in West Virginia. Check out this feel-good story, the type that those who have been here can tell you "happens all the time."



Man finds $1,000 bank deposit,
returns money to owner

Ann Ali
Daily Mail Staff



Wednesday July 12, 2006
It's understandable to see a penny and pick it up -- but to see $1,000, pick it up and then return it takes a truly Good Samaritan.

Greg Falbo, 41, was on his way home one day last month after working from 8 to 9 p.m. as a personal trainer at the Charleston YMCA and also as a maintenance worker for a local property owner.

He saw an envelope on the ground and bent down to throw it away but noticed it marked "BB&T," so he opened it.

"I thought it may be important, so I went ahead and opened it up," Falbo said.

Turns out the envelope belonged to Michael Mounts, who owns United States Investigative and Protection Agency, a private investigating firm that recently relocated to Virginia Street East.

Mounts had just left his office that Thursday evening.

He placed garbage in the nearby dumpster on Brooks Street then drove to BB&T to make a bank deposit totaling nearly $1,000, but arrived and realized he did not have the envelope he needed.

"I was carrying several things out, and it must've fallen from my hands," Mounts said. "It was a couple of checks and a money order made out to PMS, Property Management Service."

Mounts said he figured he had left the envelope on his desk, so he went home for the evening. But he soon received a call from Falbo.

Falbo told Mounts he had found the money Mounts hadn't even realized he had lost.

"It's very easy to get checks cashed in the Kanawha Valley," Mounts said. "Those could have easily been altered."

Melissa Miller knows both men. She is an intern with Mounts' company and also works at the YMCA with Falbo.

She said she wouldn't expect anything less from Falbo.

"I just wouldn't expect him to be anything other than nice," she said.

Falbo said his act of honesty was no big deal and he thought anyone would have done the same thing.

On the other hand, he's been the victim of theft before. None of his personal property was recovered after a break-in a few years ago.

"I'm sure it just ended up in a dumpster somewhere," he said. "It really would have been nice to have some of my personal items back."

So, understanding how it feels to lose important things, he went about the painless task of simply looking up Mounts' name in a phone book to say he had his check.

"It took a half hour of my time, and that's really not a lot to do for someone," he said.