Vegas cabbie who turned in $300,000 wins award
It’s Christmas in October for Gerardo Gamboa.
Gamboa, the Las Vegas taxi driver who found $300,000 in the back of his cab just before Christmas last year and turned it over to his supervisors to find the rightful owner, has won another accolade.
The shy and humble 14-year Checker Cab driver who won international acclaim the day before Christmas Eve after his stunning discovery is going to San Antonio, Texas, to be presented the Taxicab, Limousine & Paratransit Association’s 2014 Taxicab Driver of the Year award on Friday.
It’s the first time a driver from a Nevada company has won the international award.
Gamboa, who won Yellow Checker Star’s Driver of the Year award after the incident, received a $10,000 reward from the grateful high-stakes poker player who accidentally left a shopping bag with six stacks of $100 bills in the back seat of the cab.
The driver had picked up the passenger at the Cosmopolitan and took him to Palms Place, where he was given a $5 tip. When Gamboa went to Bellagio to pick up his next customer, a doorman took the bag left in the back seat of the car and put it in the front passenger seat. When stopped at a traffic light after the pickup, Gamboa peered into the bag and discovered the cash.
Gamboa, a devout Catholic, said he was giving some of the reward money to his church.
Yellow Checker Star General Manager Bill Shranko said Gamboa spent the rest of the money to buy a used car since his vehicle was on its last legs.
The cab company never identified the poker player who requested a meeting with Gamboa to personally give him the reward and shake his hand.
After the incident, Yellow Checker Star received calls from around the world praising Gamboa for his honesty and the company for doing the right thing.
“Drivers around the world were lifted up by his story,” Shranko said. “The news hit every continent. We even got a phone call from a driver in Paris, France, who wanted to thank him and congratulate him.”
Nowhere was the story more welcome than in Gamboa’s native Philippines which was devastated on Dec. 7 that year by a tsunami triggered by an earthquake off the coast of Japan.
“After going through that, this was a great story that made everybody in his home country proud,” Shranko said. “It was part of the recovery process.”
Shranko and Gamboa leave for San Antonio today.
“It’s a well-deserved honor,” Shranko said. “He works long hours every day and after work, his whole life is his family. He’s honest, has never been late for work a day in his life and is just a sweetheart of a guy.”
Since the incident, a passenger once asked Gamboa if he knew the honest driver.
“I told her I know him very well, because he is me,” he said.
Gamboa will be presented with the award at the association’s 96th annual convention and trade show at the Grand Hyatt San Antonio-Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center.
The Rockville, Md.-based association’s event is the world’s largest gathering of for-hire fleet executives.
Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Find him on Twitter: @RickVelotta.
