How a find-a-phone app led police to another man’s trunk

A man used an app to find his cellphone that he told police was stolen from his bag during an outing at the beach.

The man said he set his bag down and walked to the surf minutes before 7 p.m. Sunday. He told Myrtle Beach police he noticed his phone was missing when he returned to find his belongings “scattered on the beach,” according to an incident report.

The man traced the whereabouts of his phone, using an app, to a home on Oak Drive, police said.

One man at the address told officers he found the phone on the sidewalk near the Boardwalk Hotel, where he works, but police noted in the report that the man “appeared to be nervous when asked about the cellphone.”

The cellphone was retrieved from underneath a floor mat in the trunk of the man’s car and was returned to its owner, according to the report.

This story was originally published June 5, 2017 at 2:53 PM with the headline "How a find-a-phone app led police to another man’s trunk."