Long-lost rings are returned to couple
Published: February 1, 2006
Linda Scatena has been searching for her wedding band and engagement ring since last summer. And all that time, the police have been searching for her so they can return them.
Until she and her husband, Tim, recovered the rings from the police Friday night, the Scatenas thought for sure they were misplaced in their house on Patricia Lane. They had rummaged through their bedroom, their children’s bedrooms and the laundry. And last weekend, Tim took apart the drain in the bathroom to see if they were there.
“Short of being thrown out, we thought for sure they were in the house,” Linda said. “I never gave it a thought that they were at the pharmacy.”
Police had been looking for the owner of the rings since a local woman found them on the floor at the Rite Aid and turned them over to police on July 20. Local newspapers published notices in August about the missing rings that asked anyone who might have lost such valuables to call the police.
But the Scatenas, who say they read the local papers, never saw the notices. It was not until Friday, when one of their neighbors told them she saw another notice in the Thomaston Express that police were still looking for the owners of the missing rings, that the Scatenas went down to the police station.
The Scatenas brought with them an appraisal of the engagement ring and a wedding photo album that included a picture of the five-pronged, pear-shaped diamond engagement ring and wedding band with five diamond stones in it. They described the rings and the inscription is on the wedding band: “Love, Tim” followed by the couple’s wedding date of June 12, 1993.
After meeting with police for an hour and signing statements, Linda had her rings back. Linda and Tim said they are grateful to the woman who found the rings and gave them to police.
“You can replace the rings but you can’t replace what they represent,” Linda said.
The woman who found the rings said she did not want to be identified, but is very happy the owners were found.
Linda said she must have dropped the rings when she went to pick up medication for her then-7-year-old son, Tyler, who was sick with pneumonia. She had put the rings in her pocket to put lotion on her hands.
She assumes the rings fell out when she reached into her pocket to pay for the medication. It was not until that night that she realized they were missing.
“Lesson learned — don’t put your rings in your pocket,” she said, adding she should have called police, too.
Police Chief Eugene Torrence said state law permits police to hold on to missing valuables for a year.
After that, they can be auctioned off and the chief can decide whether the proceeds should go to a Police Benevolent Association or the town’s general fund.
But Torrence said he would have “exhausted all avenues” to find the owners before having them sold.
“It’s extremely gratifying when you can do something like this,” he said. “When you see the looks on their faces … yeah, it’s great.”
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