A homeless man in San Francisco will receive $100,000 in reward money for helping police re-capture two escaped convicts, it was determined Tuesday.
ABC News reported that Matthew Hay-Chapman was walking to McDonalds for his daily cup of coffee the morning of Jan. 30 when he spotted a stolen white van he said looked like the one he'd read about in the newspaper.
Hay-Chapman saw a man exit the van and enter the McDonalds. After following the man inside and determining it was one of the escaped convicts, he ran out to the street and flagged down a passing patrol car.
"He is the guy who deserves the reward," said Shawn Nelson, supervisor for Orange County's 4th District. "He was fully engaged in helping catch the bad guys."
After Hossein Nayeri, 37, and Jonathan Tieu, 20, were arrested, the Orange County Board of Supervisors was tasked with dividing up the $150,000 reward offered by the Orange County Central Men's Jail.
On Tuesday, they awarded Hay-Chapman the lion's share, and awarded Target employees Hazel Javier and Jeffrey Arana — who also called the police after spotting the escapees — $15,000 each. Armando Damien, who reported his white van stolen, was awarded $20,000.
Long Ma, a cab driver held hostage for a week by the men will not receive any award money, as he did not provide information leading to the inmates' recapture.
"He’s between a rock and a hard place," said Orange County Supervisor Todd Spitzer,
CBS Los Angeles reported. "I feel terrible. I’ll sit with him in the legislature and beg the legislature to revoke that law because that’s a bad law."
The FBI will award an additional $30,000 for the arrests, and the U.S. Marshals' office will also award $20,000. Both distributions are still being decided upon.
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