Lost Oscars hero in happy ending

This year's Oscars will have a very special and unexpected guest of honour. Willie Fulgear, the scrap metal dealer who found 52 of 55 stolen Oscars while on a scavenger hunt behind a cheap supermarket was given a $50,000 reward yesterday, and will be attending Sunday night's ceremony.

Fulgear, who currently lives in a one-room apartment in Los Angeles, said he will use the money to buy a home in his native Mississippi, and said his story should serve as a lesson that honesty pays.

The junk salvager said it was his dream to meet host and comedian Billy Crystal and Oscar-nominated actor Denzel Washington, and hoped he would be brought onstage.

"I'm a poor man who stumbled on some gold, I guess,'' Fulgear told reporters at a press conference to announce his award. "Some people wouldn't have given them back, but my momma didn't raise me that way.''

Authorities are still hunting for the three missing Oscars.