PLANT CITY, Fla. (WFLA) – Army veteran Ronnie Duffey made a bad decision two years ago, and it cost him his sister’s diamond wedding rings.
“Everything just fell apart and we couldn’t afford anything,” Duffey said.
Desperate for cash, and with his sister’s permission, he dropped off her diamond wedding rings at Pawn Express in Plant City. He took out a $200 loan and paid interest of $50 every month. It has been two years, and Duffey paid $1,300.
Last week, he went back to Pawn Express to pay off his $300 balance and pick up the rings. But they were gone. “They can’t find them,” Duffey said he was told.
He said the pawn shop owner told him, “I’m sorry. They should be there. There’s no reason they should be gone.”
Duffey turned to 8 On Your Side, but Pawn Express owner Marie Polk had no answers. At first, she told News Channel 8 she doesn’t know where the rings are. Then she said Duffey was in default and on Dec. 28 the rings were sent off to be “scrapped.”
Polk insisted Duffey was in default, even though his receipt does not show that. She could not say how much he was in default. The law requires a pawn shop to hold goods for at least 60 days and to hold for 30 days after the second default before they goods can be kept by the shop, according to Plant City police.
Detectives are investigating what happened to these rings.
Meanwhile, Duffey is losing hope. “The law says you have to have a record,” Duffey said. “So if you all of a sudden come up with the idea that maybe you’ll pull them, then why do you keep taking payments?”