Man paid USPS carriers to steal credit cards in $750,000 identity theft scam, DA says
Several mail carriers for the United States Postal Service were paid by a ringleader to steal credit cards from mail they delivered in a $750,000 identity theft scam, a district attorney’s office said.
More than 1,000 credit cards were stolen from customers in New York and Virginia.
Michael Richards, 37, who was the ringleader according to authorities, was charged with recruiting several USPS workers to steal credit cards, which would then be used to buy luxury goods from stores such as Hermes, Chanel, Louis Vuitton and Neiman Marcus, the Manhattan, NY district attorney’s office said in a Dec. 8 news release.
He “paid the mail carriers different amounts depending on how well the cards they stole performed,” according to the office.
“This holiday season, we know that identity thieves will be targeting not just our inboxes, but our mailboxes,” Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. said in a statement.
His office announced the indictment of 10 people in the conspiracy, which resulted in the theft of more than $750,000 between January 2017 and August 2019.
Richards recruited and paid USPS mail carriers to steal the credit cards while delivering mail along their routes in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Burke, Virginia, according to the district attorney’s office.
The accused USPS workers include Kennisha Murrell, 36; Curquan Highsmith, 31; Bruce Bienvenu, 31; and Kenneth Freeman Jr., 25.
“Today’s indictment alleges an elaborate, national fraud scheme that betrayed our mail delivery system to prey on innocent victims,” Dermot Shea, NYPD police commissioner, said in a statement on Dec. 8.
After the mail carriers stole the cards, a person acting as a courier, identified as 38-year-old Shamar Haughton, would retrieve the cards, the district attorney’s office said.
Then Justin Forgenie, 33, is accused of figuring out the victimized cardholders’ personal information through online databases and handing that information over to Richards.
Richards would then direct another person, Tatiana Smith, 34, to use the stolen credit cards to buy goods at stores that also included Best Buy, Bloomingdale’s and Macy’s alongside luxury retailers, according to the release.
He ordered Smith “to purchase items that could easily be resold, or returned for store credit which was then sold for cash.”
After two years, the fraud was noticed by a credit card company after realizing “a pattern of new cards not reaching their owners,” the release said.
This company contacted the United States Postal Inspection Service which helped investigate the scheme with the district attorney’s office and the NYPD.
The accused mail carriers were called a “gang of criminals” by USPIS Inspector in Charge, Philip R. Bartlett, in a statement.
“The USPS has more than 640,000 professional and dedicated employees. Unfortunately, we occasionally identify a few bad actors who are swiftly removed from government service,” Bartlett said.
All 10 defendants were charged in a New York State Supreme Court indictment with charges including fourth-degree conspiracy and three counts of second-degree grand larceny among other charges, according to the release.
McClatchy News has reached out to the district attorney’s office for further comment and to request contact information for the defendants’ attorneys, which was not included in the release.
This story was originally published December 10, 2021 at 8:51 AM with the headline "Man paid USPS carriers to steal credit cards in $750,000 identity theft scam, DA says."
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