A homeless couple who live beneath a bridge outside of São Paulo, Brazil, are being praised for turning in bags of stolen money they discovered on the sidewalk near a bus stop.

Rejaniel de Jesus Silva Santos and his partner Sandra Regina Domingues stumbled across bags containing 20,000 Brazilian reals (approximately $10,000 CAD), cash that had been stolen from a nearby sushi restaurant.

"Officials said the pair was out for a dawn stroll when they heard an alarm. They walked closer to see what was going on and stumbled on a briefcase and a garbage bag full of money. The pair alerted a nearby security guard, asking him to call the police," the Associated Press reports.

"My mother taught me that I should not steal," Santos told local media, speaking in Portuguese.

"The first thing that came into my head was call the police."

Santos and Domingues earn a combined $15 a day as collectors of recyclable trash.

Within hours of turning in the money, the couple was interviewed on local television, threatened by the disgruntled thieves, and offered temporary shelter in a hotel by the owners of the restaurant.

"We are very grateful," said one of the restaurant owners, Daniel Uemura. "It was an act of extreme humility and honesty that needs to be commended."

As a reward, the owners of the restaurant are offering either courses that will land the couple jobs with the company that owns the restaurant, or paid travel and moving costs to the Brazilian state of Maranhão, where they can be reunited with Santos' estranged family.

Santos hasn't seen his family in 16 years, since he arrived in São Paulo to work in the construction industry with his brother.

"My mother taught me that I must not steal and to tell the police if I see anyone doing anything (illegal)," he said. "If she sees me on TV there in Maranhão she'll know that her son is still one of the honest people in the world."

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