A street cleaner from Essex has been dubbed “the most honest man in the world,” after he found a Rolex watch worth £21,000 and handed it in. Not that honest, you say? Well later that day, in the same place, he found three more watches and, rather than seeing it as fate and keeping one for himself, he handed them all in to the police as well.
Mr Arron Large could be in line for a £60,000 windfall if nobody claims the watches in 30 days, so long as no criminal activity is detected in conjunction to their coincidental unearthing.
Upon discovering an identical watch just 100 yards away from the drain in which Mr Large found the first Rolex, he said: “I told my colleague, ‘You’re not going to believe me but I’ve found another one.’
“He said ‘Shut up,’ but when I took it out and wiped it off, I realised it was another Rolex. Then I found the other two. It’s quite amazing. To be honest, it’s baffled everybody. Perhaps they were stolen and hidden there. Or maybe someone had a guilty conscience and dumped them there.”
The first watch, which was in a drain near Chalkwell railway station in Essex, is an 18-carat gold Oyster Perpetual Cosmograph from Rolex’s Daytona collection, worth £21,000.
After finding the second on Wednesday morning, Mr Large later returned to the first drain with a film crew and found two more watches – a Franck Muller and a limited-edition Omega Seamaster with the words ‘40 years of James Bond’ engraved on the back.
Essex Police have established the first Rolex was made in Singapore and bought in Hong Kong. It has not been reported stolen.
A spokesman said: ‘We are keeping all lines of inquiry open, and these include the possibility that these watches may have been hidden by a criminal looking to dispose of stolen goods.’
Mr Large, a father of two who lives with his partner Rachel Cozins, 25, added: “I’ve handed them in to the police and they are going to go through the records to see if they can find out who they belong to or if they are stolen.”
He claims that, should he end up receiving a payout, he will not leave his job because he enjoys it so much.
By Ella White
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