Just weeks before the 72nd Academy Awards, a nightmare scenario occurred: 55 gold-plated Oscar statuettes were stolen from a loading dock in Bell, California. The shipment, which was traveling from the manufacturer in Chicago to Los Angeles, vanished, leading to a massive LAPD investigation and fear that the ceremony would have no trophies to hand out. Fortunately, a few days later, a man named Willie Fulgear discovered 52 of the stolen Oscars in a trash bin behind a grocery store in Koreatown while searching for cardboard. The Academy rewarded Fulgear with $50,000 and two tickets to the ceremony. The three remaining statues remained missing for years; one was eventually discovered during a drug raid in Florida in 2003. This incident led the Academy to change its security protocols and always keep a surplus of statuettes in a secure, undisclosed location.