NEW CHICAGO, IN—A volunteer firefighter got the surprise of his life this weekend after withdrawing cash from the ATM inside Family Express on Old Ridge Road.
His balance was a little higher than he expected.
In fact, it was millions and millions of dollars higher than he expected.
Charles "CJ" Calvin said he couldn't believe it when he saw his ATM receipt after getting cash to pay his rent and saw his balance listed as $8.2 million.
"Holy crap, this has got to be wrong," Calvin said was his first thought when he saw the receipt.
"I'm like, 'What in the world is going on? There's no way I have $8.2 million in my bank account.'"
So he made another withdrawal.
And in little black numbers at the bottom of the receipt it still was there — "Balance= $8.2 million."
"Holy (expletive)," he said. "This has got to be some kind of screw up."
Calvin checked with the store clerk. She told him no one else had problems with the ATM that day.
He showed the receipt to his friends in the New Chicago Police Department. They couldn't believe it either.
Monday morning Calvin called his bank.
Indeed, it was too good to be true.
His actual balance was $13.69.
He said the bank thinks the ATM has some kind of problem where it prints the wrong balances on customer receipts.
Calvin said if that's the case the ATM needs to be fixed because it's going to cause problems and make people worried.
"It scared the hell out of me," Calvin said. "I live paycheck to paycheck to paycheck just like everybody else. I'm a volunteer fireman. I can't have no bad look on me and on my department."
Although, Calvin admitted all that money sure would be nice to have.
After all, he's a single father with three children under age 6 at home, including a school-age son who has to complete his e-learning assignments on Calvin's cellphone because they don't have wireless internet in his house.
At the same time, Calvin knew he never was going to keep the money, even if it somehow actually was his.
He said he'd share at least some of it with his community.
"I just want to do right by my town and by myself. I've got standards and I'm not going to bust that for nobody," Calvin said. "I want to be upfront and honest and a good-standing citizen in my town."
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