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Flying Highway Laptop Returned To Owner

ST. Paul, Minn. (WCCO) -- A missing laptop is on its way home and it's in surprisingly good condition after falling off a car on a highway, spending time on TV and now being reunited with its owner.

It's been quite a week for Jacki Bilek and her 19-year-old son Alex.

"He saw this package on top of the car in front of us," Bilek said.

They both tried to warn the driver, but it was too late. They saw a laptop fly off the roof of a car driving onto I-94, pulled over and picked it up.

They posted an ad on Craigslist and talked about it on TV.

"It's a very nice laptop and if it were mine, I would hope someone would do the same thing," said Alex.

And somehow, they found the owner -- or the owner found them.

"We finally needed our computer Friday afternoon, went to get it in the backseat of the car, it wasn't there, checked the car three or four different times," Jim Loude said.

Loude took his son up to Bemidji State for college and when he asked at the hotel if they'd found a missing laptop, they had some interesting information for him.

"She said she saw a report on 'CCO that somebody had found a lost laptop that fell off a car and we just couldn't believe it," Loude said.

It was true and they were reunited Sunday afternoon.

"Can you believe it does not have a scratch on it?" said Bilek.

Alex is starting college in a few weeks and plans to be a police officer, so he feels like he solved his first case. Loude did take care of Alex with a bit of a finder's fee.

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