A gold teeth grill. A hearing aid. An $850 ring. A Captain America stuffed doll. Those are some of the items up for bid in an online auction that began Wednesday.
But this is no ordinary auction.
Everything came from the Dallas County medical examiner's office.
Lone Star Auctioneers co-owner Marilyn Burgess said she knows from more than 40 years in the auction business that there is nothing normal about unclaimed property — wherever it comes from.
“There’s value in so many things that we may wince from seeing,” she said. “There’s value to someone who maybe buys gold to scrap.”
The property owners are no longer around to claim items like gold and diamond jewelry, which are cleaned and sanitized.
And next of kin for the deceased also did not claim the items.
“There is nothing normal that we sell in the way of unclaimed property,” Burgess said. “We sell for different states the contents of unclaimed safe deposit boxes, and things that come out of safe deposit boxes are like grandma’s teeth. Sometimes they have gold. Sometimes they’re just dentures.”
Auction profits will go into the county general fund.
Bidding closes Nov. 7, but the county will auction more unclaimed property in about six months.
Got a tip? Email Marina Trahan Martinez at mmartinez@kera.org. You can follow Marina at @HisGirlHildy.
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