“This Is a Real Thing Banks Do” — Cleaning Lady Warns About Trap Money on Job Sites

You could face jail time if you take a penny from a federal building.

That's according to cleaning lady and TikToker The Best EVER ( @the.best.everr24 ), who posted a viral video explaining the concept of "trap money" in her line of work.

"OK, y'all ready to see this trap money? I told you I would find it," the TikToker states while talking into her phone, she then flips the lens around to show a table. She points the lens in the small crevice between the table and the trap money in question: a single penny on the floor.

"You see that penny? Right there? That's the trap money right there. That's one. Even though, even though that's just a penny, if I were to go ahead and move that, take that, put it on a desk, if I put it on a desk I'm in trouble," she states.

"If I take that I go to jail for a felony because this is a federal institution and that is theft even though it's just a penny," she states after flipping the camera back onto her face.

"So that's what these banks do. That's what some organizations with money do. They purposely leave it out to see if you gonna steal s--t. Even if it's a penny, it could be a, y'all done seen a whole bunch of silver dollars I done found, a whole bunch of quarters, pennies too. Trap money time," she says at the end of the clip, warning folks about the dangers of trap money for folks in her profession.

The government takes any type of theft or criminal action against government offices very, very seriously.

Which understandably will probably put a lot of people up in arms.

There are numerous instances where it seems like the federal government has double standards for crimes when it comes to the government versus the interests of private citizens.

For instance, there was this Brooklyn dad who ended up shooting a home intruder who's been arrested on 19 separate occasions and racked up a rap sheet of trespassing, burglary, and attempted assault.

Despite the fact that someone was breaking into his home, this Brooklyn man was "facing jail time" for defending himself against an intruder. This Florida law enforcement team had a different response to an older man who stabbed an intruder to death after the criminal shot his wife in the face.

This 22-year-old didn't receive the same glowing praise from law enforcement after shooting an intruder who broke into his home, however in 2023 — he ended up facing a murder charge.

But The Federal Criminal Attorneys does state that for folks who steal money/property from a federal building that is worth $1,000 or more, they could face "a potential maximum of 10 years in federal prison and a fine," as per Section 641.

If that amount is less than $1,000, however, the article states: "the maximum term of imprisonment decreases to one year plus a fine."

This means that depending on the judge that presides over the case, had the cleaning employee picked up that penny and stolen it, she very well could've been forced to pay a hefty fine and faced up to a year in jail.

It turns out there were other users on the application who were well versed in the world of monetary avoidance in federal buildings, like this one person who penned: "My mom used to clean banks and I went with her once and she told me if I found any coins/bills to IGNORE IT and leave it there."

Another person who said they worked for a cleaning service remarked that while they never took the money at the buildings they worked at, they were also instructed to place it on a table: "I used to clean a bank. If we didn't pick that up and leave it on [a] desk, we would get written up for poor cleaning. This seems suspicious."

There was also a person who said they work at a bank who now understands why money is left on the floor: "I work at a bank. We don’t do this. Now it makes sense why the cleaning company leaves pennies on the floor. I’m like so y’all not cleaning."