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CNN Sunday Morning

Interview with Oscar Carter, Jarvarious Jones, Patricia Cooper

Aired February 17, 2002 - 11:22   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: It seems we too often hear about the kids doing things wrong. Well this story is about two 13- year-old boys in Florida, who did it just right. The boys found $4,000 in a trash bag near a bus stop in Tampa and instead of going on a spending spree with the stacks of $100 bills, they instead turned the money in to their school principal, believe it or not.

Joining us now from Tampa are the good doers, Oscar Carter and Jarvarious Jones and their Assistant Principal, Patricia Cooper. Thanks for joining us, you guys.

PATRICIA COOPER, ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL: Thank you for inviting us.

WHITFIELD: Hey, all right well gentlemen, give me the scoop here. You're sitting at the bus stop. You're talking about what kind of games to play for PE, and then you come across this wad of money?

OSCAR CARTER: Yes.

JARVARIOUS JONES: Yes.

WHITFIELD: Explain that, and how did you see the money and what did you do?

CARTER: We took it to school and we turned it in.

WHITFIELD: But before all of that, you looked at the money, you counted it or you saw the stacks of bills. What were your initial thoughts?

CARTER: Taking it.

JONES: Taking it.

CARTER: Keeping it and taking it home, buying us stuff like TV and bikes.

WHITFIELD: So Jarvarious, when you saw the money, you started thinking about, "wow, my mom really could use this money, right?"

JONES: Yes.

WHITFIELD: And my family could really use this money to pay some bills. Immediately, did you have a sense as to how much money you had on your hands?

JONES: Yes. Not really though.

WHITFIELD: Well, how did you know how much you had? What did you do?

JONES: Well I gave it to the Assistant Principal and she had counted it with the other stacks and stuff.

WHITFIELD: Before you gave it to your school principal, it sounds like you guys really thought it through, exactly what to do with this money. You could have, you know, done the knee jerk reaction, which is what a lot of people would do, is go out and spend it or figure out ways to spend it.

But the two of you kind of talked about the right and the wrong thing to do. What did you discuss between yourselves? You know, Oscar, why don't you pick this up. What did you guys discuss in order to figure out what the right decision would be?

CARTER: We was going to like keep the money, and we was going to take it home and give it to our parents so we could buy stuff. But we thought about taking it to school, so we could give it to her. And so, we did the right thing. That's what we did.

WHITFIELD: For a second, though, were you really thinking that you know what, I could use this money? I could think of a few things that I'd like to buy right now.

CARTER: Yes. That's why we was thinking about keeping it and buying us some clothes, shoes and bikes, and all kinds of stuff.

WHITFIELD: So what is it in you that made you do an about face and decide, you know what, we're going to give the money or take the money to my school principal?

CARTER: I don't know.

JONES: I didn't know what we was going to do.

CARTER: My mom just brought me up to be honest, so I just turned it in.

WHITFIELD: Well your mom brought you up right, that's for sure. Well, Patricia Cooper, why don't I bring you in now. You see these two young boys. They bring in a wad of cash. They bring it to you. What in the world was going through your mind at that point? Where did they get this money?

COOPER: I asked them, I immediately asked them a question. I said you know, "where did you all get this money?" I was so excited about it, and they told me that they found it on the way to school. So I immediately told them that you all did the right thing.

We counted the money and we found out how much money it was, and shortly afterwards, the resource officer came in the office and we turned the money over to him, and he again instilled in the students that this was the right thing to do.

Because in the Hillsboro County School System, we build character, and a part of building character is showing the students that hey, they are connecting. This is one way that we showed them that they are connecting and doing the right thing and making the right choice. We're very, very proud of these two students.

WHITFIELD: Did your gut tell you to be a little nervous about where this money could have come from? Who might be looking for this money once they discovered that it was no longer in their possession?

COOPER: Yes, and I told them, I said "you need to turn it all in" I said "because this can be drug money, or it can be somebody's life savings." So turn the money in. You know, we want all of the money. Turn all of the money in and they emptied their pockets and turned in to me hundreds of dollars. There were about four other adults in the office, and you know, we counted the money.

WHITFIELD: So in the end, the money then went to the police. You went to the authority, and come to find out there was this person out there, a tourist, right, from Chicago.

COOPER: Yes.

WHITFIELD: Who lost his money and it was returned to him, and so the lessons learned here for the kids that honesty really does pay off. But had the owner not come about 90 days later, these kids would have had some extra cash on their hands, right?

COOPER: Yes, they would have and they had already decided on how they were going to spend the money.

WHITFIELD: All right, so boys have you gotten a chance to meet the owner of the money?

JONES: Can you say that again?

WHITFIELD: What's that?

JONES: Can you say that again?

WHITFIELD: Did you get a chance to meet the owner of the money?

JONES: Yes, we did.

WHITFIELD: And what happened?

JONES: He took me and my mother and my brother out to eat and stuff. He took us out to eat and he bought me an outfit.

WHITFIELD: Wow. Oh, that's so nice. So you see your honesty really did pay off and you guys must feel great about what you did, right, knowing that it really brought the owner of the money some happiness too, right?

JONES: Uh huh. COOPER: He came to school in the morning to meet Jarvarious.

WHITFIELD: All right, thanks very much to all of you for joining us and you know, you all did such a great thing and you've been a fine example for all of us. So, if anyone else comes across a big wad of money like this, they've learned from you that it really does pay off to be honest. Thanks very much, Oscar Carter and Jarvarious Jones and Patricia Cooper. Thanks for joining us from Tampa.

COOPER: Thank you.

JONES: You're welcome.

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