Law in Australia suggests I can be charged with 'theft by finding' if I don't make a reasonable attempt to identify the owner. This seems to be impossible in this instance... seems a shame to hand it in to police.. who are likely not educated enough to know what to do with it. What would you do?
First time I heard of term theft by finding, and it's not like you find some identification documents or picture of a person, but I guess you could put an add and say you found a plastic card with words and you are looking for owner.
If someone calls you back, they should identify at least five or ten words from this cards in reasonable amount of time, without looking at card image, but don't go in any meetings alone.
Don't mention anything about Bitcoin, or you will get a bunch of fake owners and scammers calling you.
This sounds horribly unethical. The coins don't belong to the OP. The original owner might have a backup and might try to move the funds once they notice that their paper wallet is missing.
Let's say few weeks and months pass and nothing happens.
Would you simply burn the words, give it to police, or maybe give it to some poor people?