Good Samaritan finds wedding ring on snow-covered highway, hopes to track down owner

Douglas Benedetti encountered a man frantically searching for a ring on the shoulder of Interstate 80 in Northern California last month. The man told Benedetti that his wedding ring slid off his cold finger while putting chains on his vehicle.

"He was installing his chains without gloves on, his hands got cold [and] he didn’t realize his ring had slipped off," Benedetti told ABC News.

The man was using the light from his cell phone to search for the missing jewelry. He soon gave up and drove off.

Benedetti, a snow chain installer, returned to the area after he finished work, around 1 a.m., and started his own search for the ring using his head lamp and hand light.

"He kinda gave me a general idea, about a 1/8 to a quarter mile stretch of roadway to look for it," said Benedetti.

Within an hour, he found the ring buried in the snow next to a semi-truck.

"It was a really good feeling when I found it, but it would be a much better feeling if I could give it back," Benedetti told Fox40.

With no name or contact information for the man — all Benedetti knows about the Bay Area man is that he was heading for Tahoe or Reno for the weekend — Benedetti is now hoping to track down the owner using the platinum ring's inscription:

"Lisa, 5th June, 2010."

"It happened so fast," he told ABC News. "I've never been married, but I know that if a husband loses his wedding ring someone else is going to be very upset."

"I was able to do for him what he couldn’t do for himself, and I’d like to give it back to him; and he, in return, can pay it forward to someone else later in life," Benedetti told CBS Sacramento, adding that he hopes someone who knows the owner will see the story and help reconnect the owner with the ring.