Hotel searching for homeless man who returned woman's stolen wallet

ATLANTA — An Atlanta hotel is searching for a homeless good Samaritan who returned a woman's stolen wallet after finding it in a trash can.

Right now, the Omni Hotel at the CNN Center only has a name and surveillance picture of the homeless man.

Management at the hotel told Channel 2's Amy Napier Viteri that after finding a woman's wallet the man went out of his way to find the hotel where she was staying. Now hotel management wants to find that man so they can return the kindness.

"We actually had a homeless person who came into the hotel and wanted to say he had found a wallet when he was going through the garbage can looking for food," Omni's managing director Scott Stuckey told Viteri.

Omni hotel management gave Viteri a surveillance picture that shows the man they say came to the hotel on Nov. 7 trying to return the wallet he found inside a trash can on Marietta Street.

The man told hotel staff his name was Josh Crabber and he had gone to at least one other downtown hotel looking for the wallet's owner.

"So he decided he would come here to the Omni to check and fortunately she was registered here," Stuckey said.

Stuckey said the wallet's owner and hotel guest was visiting from France for a conference. In an incident report she told Atlanta police someone had robbed her earlier that day.

"She was coming out and she got pushed and when she was pushed they ended up taking her entire purse," Stuckey said.

She got her identification and credit cards returned after the man's effort to find her. Now the hotel wants to find him.

"When you're looking through food in the garbage can, it's probably one of the toughest times of his life. But when you find somebody's wallet and you do the right thing, I think we'd like to do the right thing by this person," Stuckey told Viteri.

The hotel wants to give the man a $500 reward and have him spend Thanksgiving at the Omni, including dinner and room service the next day.

"Every person has a story and this person obviously has a story and did the right thing by bringing it to try to find the person," Stuckey said.

Anyone who knows who the man might be is asked to call Elizabeth Ergle, the hotel's marketing manager, at 404-818-4419 or email her at eergle@omnihotels.com.

WSBTV