Grandmother Thumbs Nose at Heirs, Shreds $1.1M

Authorities believe an elderly Austrian woman must have really hated her heirs after they found more than $1 million in cash cut up on her bed, the AFP reports. The 85-year-old woman died in a retirement home surrounded by thousands of destroyed euros—in 100 and 500 notes, according to Austrian newspaper Kurier—and shredded savings accounts books. Authorities, who believe the woman was trying to spite her heirs, announced the bizarre find Thursday.

If she indeed was trying to teach her relatives a lesson she failed, the AFP reports. "If the heirs can only find shreds of money and if the origin of the money is assured, then of course it can all be replaced," an official at Austria's central bank says. "If we didn't pay out the money then we would be punishing the wrong people." (This New York woman left $100,000 to her cockatiels.)