Waterfront employee returns cash

DAVAO CITY – The times may be hard but 25-year-old Arnie Mepico, a security detective at Waterfront Hotel Davao, did not think twice in returning a woman’s bag left on a table in the hotel’s lobby last April 18.

Jaybee Cometa, the hotel’s chief security manager, said the bag contained more than P92,000 in cash, both in peso and US dollar, and several pieces of jewelry and expensive watches.

Cometa said Mepico could have hidden the bag in a safe place and perhaps retrieved it later since no one saw him with it.

“But he really walked the more than 300 meters from the hotel entrance to our office just to turn it over to us. And we commend him for it,” Cometa said.

Mepico said, “I really have to turn it over. I had no intention of keeping it. Actually, when I saw it first, all I had in mind was to return it.”

Brenda Arabe, marketing communications officer at the hotel, said the bag belonged to a sister of a bride whose wedding reception was held at Waterfront Hotel Davao that afternoon.– Edith Regalado