USPS employee stole $40,000 worth of mailed checks and sold them on dark web, feds say
A former U.S. Postal Service mail carrier is going to prison after admitting to stealing checks along his mail route in Alabama over the course of a month, federal prosecutors say.
The stolen checks were worth more than $40,000 in total, according to the U.S Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Alabama.
Following his arrest, the 31-year-old man, of Huntsville, told investigators he sold these checks over the dark web and they ended up in the hands of his unidentified “associates,” prosecutors said.
The man was sentenced to one year and six months in federal prison on Feb. 10, the attorney’s office announced in a news release. In November, he pleaded guilty to receipt of stolen mail matter and theft of mail by a postal employee in connection with the case.
McClatchy News contacted the former mail carrier’s attorney for comment on Feb. 13 and didn’t immediately receive a response.
“The vast majority of U.S. Postal Service employees are honest, hardworking individuals who would never dream of violating the public trust in this manner,” Jonathan Ulrich, the special agent in charge of the USPS’ Office of the Inspector General, said in a statement.
“An employee who decides otherwise will be aggressively investigated by our special agents and law enforcement partners.”
The case dates back to March 2022, when the former USPS employee started stealing checks, until April when he was caught, according to prosecutors.
During this time period, investigators learned an unspecified company, whose mailbox was located along the man’s mail route, had 14 checks worth over $43,000 stolen, court documents show.
In March, the man stole one check from another unspecified company and gave it to another man, who scrubbed the name of the payee off the check, court documents show. The man is accused of continuing to provide this individual with checks.
In April, an unnamed confidential source told investigators about how the man admitted to stealing about 40 checks from his USPS mail route and could sell them, according to court documents.
Later that month, the confidential source coordinated a meetup with the man while wearing a recording device in the parking lot of a Walmart in Huntsville, where the man discussed his scheme, court documents say.
The man divulged he had a “guy in Houston” who he sent the stolen checks to before selling the confidential source three checks, according to prosecutors.
Ultimately, the man was arrested and authorities found in possession of stolen checks worth over $13,000, prosecutors said. After he was read his Miranda rights, he told them he had stolen even more checks.
“Public servants who abuse their positions of trust to personally enrich themselves face serious consequences,” U.S. Attorney Prim F. Escalona said in a statement.
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