For five hours, Ashli Jones and her boyfriend Kaden Jackson retraced their steps around Casper looking for a wallet that seemed to have simply vanished.
They went back to the softball field where Jackson had been playing in a tournament on a recent Sunday. They checked a friend's house. They returned to gas stations they'd visited.
Nothing.
Eventually, they gave up and went home.
That was particularly hard for Jones, 22, who had already dealt with identity theft only weeks earlier. Now, somewhere in Casper was her wallet, containing her driver's license, debit and credit cards, Social Security card, and cash the couple needed to pay bills.
“We just thought the worst,” Jackson said.
When they got home, feeling defeated, they saw an envelope tucked beneath their welcome mat.
Jackson spotted it first.
"I told Ashli, I was like, 'If that's your wallet, it's got to be (from) the nicest person in the world," he said.
It was.
'Pretty Amazing'
Inside the envelope was the wallet they'd spent much of the day trying to find.
It was dirty, its zipper was damaged and Jackson said it looked as if it may have even been run over.
But lo and behold, when they opened it, nothing was missing.
“All the cash was accounted for,” Jackson said. “Her ID. It was like it was never opened.”
“It was pretty, pretty amazing,” Jackson said. “Made us feel really good because we were really down that day.”
The couple doesn't know exactly where Jones dropped the wallet or where the person who returned it found it.
Their mystery Good Samaritan left them just one name: David.
“That's all we know,” Jackson said.
Crisis Averted
Losing a wallet is an inconvenience under almost any circumstances. For Jones and Jackson, the timing made it frightening.
“Our worst-case scenario was all of our money getting taken because that was, like, for bills that we were actually going to pay,” Jackson said.
But the little wallet held much more than cash.
Wyoming law specifically identifies addresses, Social Security numbers, driver's license numbers and certain credit- and debit-card information as personal identifying information that can be involved in identity theft.
The Wyoming Judicial Branch warns that scammers can steal wallets and purses to obtain IDs and bank cards, and specifically advises people to keep Social Security cards somewhere safe rather than carrying them in a wallet.
Jones happened to have all of it riding around Casper in hers, and the couple knew they had good reason to take the risk seriously.
Federal Trade Commission data show Wyoming consumers filed 609 identity-theft reports in 2023. Credit-card identity theft was the largest category, accounting for 36% of the state's reports.
“My identity could have been stolen, my home could have been broken into, you know, with my address being on there,” she said.
Lost And Found
In June, Cowboy State Daily reported on divers who scour the Colorado River and other Western waters, pulling up everything from wallets and wedding rings to Apple Watches, GoPros and hundreds of cellphones.
Diver Ken Wige said his group has recovered 254 phones over four years and managed to return 50 to their owners.
One recovered phone contained something its owner considered priceless — video of her grandchild's birth.
“It's just amazing diving when you find something and can return it to someone,” Wige told Cowboy State Daily at the time.
Jones' wallet was lost above ground, but she now knows what it's like to be on the receiving end of a stranger's kindness.
“I couldn't even believe it,” said Jackson.
Thank You, David
Jones has spent most of her life in Casper, Jackson said, though she was born in California.
For her, the wallet's unlikely return became a small affirmation of the place she's chosen to call home.
If she could say something to David, it would be, “Thank you for having the best intentions,” she said.
“It just proved to me that us coming to Wyoming was a good thing,” Jones said.
Jones said she'd like to repay a stranger she knows almost nothing about in the only way she really can.
“I can do the right thing for the next person too,” she said.
Kolby Fedore can be reached at kolby@cowboystatedaily.com.
