USPS employee helps steal $5 million in checks from the mail in fraud scheme, feds say
A U.S. Postal Service employee helped steal more than $5 million worth of checks while working at a mail distribution center in Maryland, federal prosecutors said.
Marche Sisco, 26, of Suitland, used her job as mail handler assistant to steal checks from Washington Network Distribution Center in Capitol Heights, according to prosecutors. The checks were mailed through USPS.
She’s one of five Maryland residents charged in a fraud scheme involving in more than 600 personal and business checks stolen from the mail, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland announced in a Jan. 22 news release.
Sisco had not been located by authorities as of Jan. 22, the attorney’s office said. Information regarding whether she’s retained an attorney wasn’t available Jan. 23.
She no longer works for the Postal Service, Special Agent in Charge Jeffrey Krafels, of the USPS Office of the Inspector General’s Mid-Atlantic area field office, told McClatchy News on Jan. 23.
Another woman, Tianna Cosby, 23, of Upper Marlboro, stole checks from USPS collection boxes and discussed selling and distributing them with Sisco, according to an 18-count indictment.
Cosby is also accused of collecting the checks Sisco stole, the indictment says.
Cosby and three others, Tommi Cosby, 21, of District Heights; Biniah Carter, 24, of Upper Marlboro; and Zion Oluwademilade Adeduwon, 22, of Bowie, altered the stolen checks and deposited them into bank accounts of people they recruited, according to prosecutors.
Tianna Cosby, Tommi Cosby, Carter and Adeduwon specifically recruited “account mules,” who prosecutors said are people “whose bank accounts are used to deposit illegally acquired checks and proceeds of the scheme.”
Authorities arrested Tianna Cosby and Carter on Jan. 19, according to the attorney’s office. Tommi Cosby and Adeduwon hadn’t been located as of Jan. 22, prosecutors said.
McClatchy News contacted Justin Eisele, Tianna Cobsy’s defense attorney, for comment Jan. 23 and didn’t receive an immediate response. Information regarding the other defendants’ legal representation wasn’t immediately available.
The indictment charges Sisco, Tianna Cosby, Tommi Cosby, Carter and Adeduwon with bank fraud, a conspiracy to commit mail fraud and bank fraud, and aggravated identity theft.
They’re accused of stealing the identities of at least five people while carrying out the scheme, prosecutors said.
They received the money from the stolen checks — the ones deposited into the bank accounts of “account mules” — from ATM withdrawals and account transfers, according to the attorney’s office.
If the five defendants are convicted on all counts of bank fraud and conspiracy to commit mail and bank fraud, they’d each face up to 30 years in prison, prosecutors said.
They’d also face a mandatory two years in prison for each count of aggravated identity theft, according to prosecutors.
In regards to the charges against Sisco, Krafels told McClatchy News that “the vast majority of postal employees are honest and hardworking.”
“When we get complaints we take them seriously and investigate them to the fullest extent possible,” he said.
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