Lost Woman Discovered With $36,000 Tucked Away

A 73-year-old woman found lost and disoriented in Westminster was taken by police officers to a local hospital, where doctors found $36,000 sewn into her underwear and hat, authorities said Friday.

Lt. Robert Burnett said officers aren’t sure why the woman was carrying that much cash in such a manner.

The woman’s family contacted police Friday afternoon after a local Vietnamese-language radio station broadcast information about her, Lt. Mike Schliskey said. Her daughter picked her up from the hospital, police said. Her son had filed a missing-persons report about her in Cerritos on Thursday.

The woman had been found at midnight Thursday night sitting in an apartment complex stairwell off Magnolia Street near Little Saigon. She told police she lived in Long Beach but couldn’t remember exactly where.

The woman, identified as Muoi Thi Tran, is Vietnamese, and Burnett speculated that she might have been carrying the cash out of a cultural distrust of banks and other savings institutions.

Mai Cong, chair of the Vietnamese Community of Orange County Inc., a social services organization, said that while many elderly Vietnamese don’t trust banks, it is rare for someone to walk around with that much cash. She speculated that the woman might have acted out of confusion.

Police found the woman after being called by residents.

“They were concerned because this woman was walking around confused, like she didn’t know where she should be,” Burnett said. “We get those [calls] all the time, especially for older people who need help.”

A few hours later, doctors evaluating the woman at Pacifica Hospital in Huntington Beach discovered $26,000 in $100 bills sewn into the woman’s underwear. Another $10,000 was in her hat.

Burnett said the woman told police she had traveled to Westminster earlier Thursday to visit a nephew, but couldn’t tell police the man’s name, or the name of the daughter she said she lived with in Long Beach. Police couldn’t find a missing-persons report matching her description.

Schliskey said he wasn’t sure why a national police computer network that handles missing persons reports hadn’t picked up the Cerritos report when Westminster police entered information about the woman.

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Times staff writer Janet Wilson contributed to this report.