New Haven rabbi returns “hidden” $98,000

By Judie Jacobson

NEW HAVEN – It was early September, just a few days before Rosh Hashanah, when Rabbi Noach Muroff made the discovery that this week sent him careening into the media spotlight from coast to coast.

The story began when Muroff and his wife purchased a used desk on Craigslist from a local woman for the sum of $150. When Muroff, a ninth grade teacher at the Yeshivah of New Haven, got the desk home, he found that it was too big to squeeze through the door of the room it was intended for. So, he took the door off its hinges. When the desk still didn’t fit, he removed its top, along with two file cabinets that were affixed to it.

Rabbi Noach Muroff at
the desk in which he found $98,000 in cash.
Photo credit: Esther Muroff

That was when he found a bag of cash stuffed inside the desk. Or, more specifically, a bag filled with stacks of cash in bundles of $2,000 and $5,000 – totaling $98,000.

“We counted it up a few times to be sure,” Muroff told Stefanie Butnick of Tablet Magazine. “We were laughing at each other in disbelief, we were in total shock.”

“This only happens in the movies,” he told his wife.

The Muroffs’ decision to return the case was instantaneous. “Right away my wife and I sort of you know looked at each other and said, ‘We can’t keep this money,’” he said.

As it turned out, the $98,000 was an inheritance belonging to the woman who had sold the Muroffs the desk.  It had fallen behind the desk drawer. When she went looking for it prior to selling the desk and couldn’t find it, she assumed she had stashed it somewhere else.

“We called her up to return the money to her, and she was ecstatic and beyond words, in total shock and disbelief that someone would call and return the money,” said Muroff, who brought along his four children when the couple returned the money, so that they could witness first hand the impact of a mitzvah. When the Muroffs handed over the cash to the woman, she returned the $150 they had paid for the desk, along with a note that read, “I cannot thank you enough for your honesty and integrity. I do not think there are too many people in this world that would have done what you did by calling me…. I will be forever grateful.” She also insisted on giving the family a reward.

Muroff and his wife are certain they made the right decision.

“If Hashem wants us to have this $98,000, he will make sure we have it in a way he sees fit,” Muroff told Butnick, laughing. “There’s a reason why it didn’t fit in the room and why we had to take the desk apart.”

This week the tale of the Muroffs’ kindness hit the airwaves, making its way into TV, newspaper and online reports all across the county. It was Muroff himself who made the decision to go public.

“One of the main reasons we decided to share this story was because we really want to publicize the fact of doing that which is right and that which is honest,” he told Butnick. “That’s what a Jew is supposed to do.”

Comments? email judiej@jewishledger.com.