A Queens couple pulled a safe with $100,000 in cash inside from the bottom of a lake in Corona Park while “magnet fishing,” according to a report.
The two anglers, James Kane and Barbie Agostini, tossed a line with a strong magnet on the end into the water on Friday afternoon. When they felt something bulky on the end, the pulled out an old safe.
They were able to pry the safe open and find the discovery — which was unfortunately ruined by the water — wrapped in plastic.
“It was two stacks of freaking hundreds. Big stacks,” Kane told NY1.
Kane said as veteran magnet fishermen he and Agostini had found plenty of safes before — most of which are empty, save some plastic bags used to hold cash. He expected this one to be the same.
Kane said he swore in shock. Agostini thought he was joking.
“He showed me and once I saw the actual dollars and the security ribbons I lost it,” she said.
Unfortunately, the bills were “soaking wet, pretty much destroyed,” Kane said.
They called the NYPD to avoid any legal trouble. A number of cops arrived just to check out the bizarre call that had come over the radio. They told the couple they’d never seen anything like it.
With no way to ID the owner of the safe, which was likely stolen, Kane and Agostini were allowed to keep what they found.
“I guess the finders keepers rule worked for us,” Kane said.
The couple first got into magnet fishing during the pandemic.
“We were borded during covid lockdown and I’ve always had this itch to become a treasure hunter … so we discovered something called magnet fishing,” Kane told NY1.
He called the hobby “the poor man’s treasure hunting.”
Among their finds include a WWII-era grenade they pulled out of Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn and six or seven guns, some dating back to the 19th century, in Flushing Meadows alone.
