Texas pizzeria’s viral post about tip-stealing, hat-leaving teens has a surprising result

A Texas pizzeria that had its money stolen by a group of teenagers thought of a creative way to return the looted money – and in the process found another victim of the brazen crew.

Employees of Stone Oven Pizza in Wichita Falls, Texas, posted about the horrifying situation on Facebook, explaining that the teenage thieves left behind a cowboy hat, which the workers decided to auction off to return the stolen tips.

“Last night, our crew ran into an incident where some teenagers stole tips from the tip jar… Luckily, though, they left this hat… We’re not big fans of hats around here, though, we know what a beautiful community Wichita Falls is and we would like to open an auction,” the post said.

“The highest bidder by Tuesday afternoon will win the prize of this authentic cowboy jicama-giga! All proceeds will be split equally between the three team members who lost on Tips last night! And balance will be restored to the Multiverse!”

The restaurant then updated their Facebook followers in December. 28, saying the viral post had led them to the owner of the brown-tinted cowboy hat, Justin Bent Rail, whose truck was broken into by the same sticky-fingered teenagers.

“What this attention also did was allow us to find the original owner of the hat… not the teenager who threw it away, but the gentleman whose truck had broken down in which those kids had stolen it,” the update explained.

“It was the team members themselves who decided that this man was really cold headed…we will return the property to its rightful owner.”

Although the hat could no longer be auctioned, the restaurant still cared for the staff affected by the crime.

“Don’t worry, employees have been given a $50 bonus for altruism and compassion. Not a bad result compared to the $20 some punk kid ran with,” he said with a laughing emoji.

Micheal Jones, the owner of the hat, took to Facebook to express his gratitude.

“I hate how this all turned out, but I found my hat that one [was] they stole me from the truck… and made the show Today”, he wrote.

“Great community involvement, and everyone pitches in to make sure the workers are taken care of!”