Community raises money for waitress after tip jar stolen from Carrollton restaurant

CARROLLTON, Ga. — Police in Carrollton want to know who stole a cup full of tips from a busy restaurant. The theft happened last Thursday at Jerry’s Country Kitchen.

Channel 2′s Bryan Mims was in Carrollton where one person’s thoughtlessness led to an outpouring of kindness.

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At Jerry’s Country Kitchen, Old Glory waves, coffee is at the ready, and the cathead biscuits are big and buttered. The restaurant is a bustling place for breakfast and lunch.

So busy that someone managed to snatch Mia Scudamore’s tip cup unnoticed. The cup was sitting right next to the coffee maker and behind the cash register. It had about $90 stuffed inside. Then someone came along and walked away with it.

“And I went to go add money to it and realized it was gone. So I was just looking for it,” she said.

Scudamore is 25 years old, works two jobs, and takes nursing classes. She needed that cash in the cup.

“It’s my main source of income. It pays for my school. I just got married so it pays for our house,” said Scudamore to Channel 2 Action News.

“Well, it broke my heart,” 86-year-old Jerry Eady, the owner of Jerry’s Country Kitchen said. “That money was important. She had worked for it. And somebody just took it.”

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The restaurant staff filed a police report. Miss Jerry’s son, who also works at the restaurant, wrote a post about the theft on Facebook.

Word spread fast. By the next day, people had donated more than $700.

“I felt like God gave me, gave back to me what I lost times 10. Everybody came together and was just there for me,” she said.

Miss Jerry has run the restaurant for nearly 50 years and told Channel 2 Action News her cup runneth over.

“It fills your heart with humanity. I just feel very humble that everybody loved us so much that they want to shower down on us,” Miss Jerry said.

This kind of theft has never happened before and Miss Jerry hopes it never happens again. But if it does, she said, she knows her customers’ generosity will shine through.

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