Stranger helps reunite couple with stolen 300-pound griffin statue

A Calgary couple who were frantically searching for a 300-pound griffin statue stolen from their front yard have been reunited with their treasured possession, thanks to the kindness of a stranger.

Someone found the ornament lying abandoned in a bin nearly a block away from the couple's northwest home and reached out to them, hoping to help them retrieve it.

Chris Lewis and Michelle Cheverie, who live in the Capitol Hill neighbourhood, are glad to have the hefty statue back in their midst. The statue is a cherished wedding gift from their best friends.

According to Lewis, the figure is extra special because it symbolizes his family shield, which has a griffin on it. 

While the couple wasn't sure whether they'd ever get the statue back, they received a pleasant surprise on Thursday when a stranger reached out to Cheverie on social media.

"I got a Facebook message from somebody that said, 'I know where your statue is. Call me right away,'" Cheverie told The Calgary Eyeopener. 

"And so I gave this person a call and they said that they had found it in an alley in a blue bin and thought that maybe somebody had just discarded it."

According to Cheverie, the person who originally found the griffin didn't know what it was and took it home.

They showed their daughter the large piece and she recognized it immediately from the news. The daughter explained that it was a sentimental piece that needed to be returned.

Without further ado, they reached out to Cheverie, who made arrangements to pick up the statue.

Accidental discovery

Cheverie thinks she and her husband got lucky because the griffin piece had been abandoned in an alley. 

"Somebody happened to look inside [the bin]," she said. "I think it was just an abandoned blue bin. And somebody looked inside and found it."

While Cheverie doesn't know what happened and why someone decided to discard the stolen statue, she thinks it was probably because they felt overwhelmed by the attention it received.

"Maybe they saw it on the news and thought, 'Gosh, we've got to unload this and put it in a blue bin,'" she said.

There's another possibility, according to Cheverie, who noted that the statue is quite heavy and perhaps it was "too much of a nuisance" to carry around.

While the griffin statue has been located in one piece, it has been slightly modified.

"The person that picked it up thought that they would add some colour to it," she said.

"The eyes are painted. I mean, it doesn't look terrible, but it's been painted. So we need to figure out how to remove the paint off of it."

A neighborhood favourite

Now that it's back, Cheverie doesn't want to store the statue away in a corner.

"I wanna put it back in the front," she said. "I don't think anyone's going to be brave enough to take it again."

However, the friends who gifted the griffin statue to Cheverie and Lewis suggested it might be safer in the backyard.

"It's just so beautiful. I love sharing it with people," Cheverie said. 

"Children from the daycare down the street walk by and there's one little boy that likes to come up and give it a pat.… The neighborhood enjoys it."