Rome
Italian police arrested four people this week for stealing coins worth more than $100,000 out of Rome’s Trevi Fountain. The four worked for the company that cleans the coins out each week—around $2,000 worth—and sends most of the money to charities. After one of the charities reported a sudden drop in donations, police placed the cleaning crew under surveillance. Trevi gets more income than most fountains because of the superstition, popularized in the movie Three Coins in the Fountain, that tossing a coin into the fountain ensures that one day, you will return to Rome. Rome Mayor Walter Veltroni called stealing from charities “particularly odious.”
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