Split decision over tradies’ $476k find
TWO honest tradies, who handed police hundreds of thousands of dollars they dug up on a work site, are “happy” with the outcome of a court case over the money, their lawyer says.
A legal fight over who could claim more than $476,000 in cash found buried on a Gold Coast development site last year has settled with a confidential money split agreement.
Excavator driver Warren Bruggy and labourer Daniel
Boyd were working at the Runaway Bay site when they dug up a plastic tub containing $388,850 in old paper notes on October 31 last year.
They took it straight to Runaway Bay police station, the Supreme Court heard.
The tradies then dug up a second tub containing many damaged bank notes the next day.
They claimed they were later sacked by their contractor employer because he was not first told of their discovery.
Mr Bruggy and Mr Boyd, who since have found other work, originally made a claim on the money on the basis of “finders keepers”.
The Reserve Bank later confirmed the total money found buried on the Lae Drive, Runaway Bay site, owned by Morrison Construction Services, was $476,600.
On Monday, lawyers for the land owner, Mr Bruggy and Mr Boyd and a former land owner’s son, Raymond Ma, reached a confidential settlement agreement at mediation.
Justice David Boddice on Wednesday made an order allowing the confidential agreement, while declaring Morrison Construction Services was the lawful owner of the cash. It will now be returned from police to solicitors for the land owner, to be dispersed among the parties, including the tradies, according to the secret agreement.
The land owner claimed it had a better claim to the money than a finder, as the money was found buried within the land and not on top of it, Justice Boddice said.
He said Mr Bruggy and Mr Boyd had “properly provided the funds to Queensland Police Service”.
The tradies’ lawyer, Dr Anthony Marinac, said outside court the two men were happy with the agreement.
Barrister David Topp, for the land owner, said everyone was happy that “after 10 long months” the matter had come to a resolution.
The court previously heard that a previous owner of the land, Peter Chan, claimed his brother-in-law Stephen Ma, a travelling chef who died in 2015, must have buried the money there. Mr Ma’s son, Raymond Ma, was one of the parties to the agreement.