Woman gets stolen wallet back 8 years later with cash still inside

INSIDE EDITION - A woman who thought her wallet was stolen eight years ago was stunned to get it back from the Boston Police this week — with her credit cards, social security card and $141 in cash still inside.

And in an incredible stroke of fortune, Courtney Connolly, a 30-year-old nursing student, told InsideEdition.com she desperately needed that $140 to pay for a spot in an important fitness competition this summer, and she had just three weeks to come up with the cash.

Now she wants to thank the good Samaritans who made it possible by handing over her wallet.

"There are still honest people in the world," she said. "People who go out of their way to make a difference."

Connolly was working as a production intern at the Harbour Actors Theater in Wellfleet, Massachusetts when the wallet vanished on July 25, 2009. That morning, she went to move her car and found the contents of her glove box strewn across the passenger's seat. "I think my window had been down," she said.

Her wallet was gone, and with it, the money she'd just cashed from her pay check. As a student on a fixed intern income, the loss hit her hard.

"You work so hard for that little bit of money," she said. "I was so furious. That was my money for food for the week. That was my money for gas for the week."

She contacted police, who said they would be in touch if there was any activity on her credit cards, but that never happened. So after being forced to borrow money from family — "I'm sure I was a little ashamed" — and getting new copies of her credit cards and identification, she says she soon forgot about the missing wallet.

Until last Monday.

Her sister-in-law, who now lives with Connolly's brother in the house where they grew up, texted her to say someone had found her wallet and given it to a police officer in west Roxbury.