Investigative Case Highlights

For most mail carriers in the United States, a career with the Postal Service provides steady income, generous benefits, and a one-of-a-kind connection to the community they serve. However, some squander it all by colluding with criminals who know postal employees are highly desirable prey, given their access to the vast postal network.

If you keep up with our Investigative Case Highlights , you know people who defraud the workers’ compensation program go out of their way to keep their schemes secret. We previously wrote about a case where a postal employee milked an alleged ankle injury for over 14 years while gainfully employed, and another where our special agents caught an employee dancing the night away while claiming an injury had left him totally disabled. This health care claimant investigation, however, may well take...

Some of our fraud investigations find perpetrators who are fueled by sheer greed, but others sometimes uncover different motives. Our special agents started a case after Postal Service management alerted them of suspicious transactions on agency-issued credit cards used for fueling postal vehicles (also known as Voyager cards). At the onset, it seemed two postal employees were making fuel charges in excess, so our investigators collected evidence and launched a detailed analysis of the charges.

Everybody loves free stuff, right? But what if it’s medical supplies you didn’t ask for and don’t actually need? And what if a company keeps sending you stuff after you ask it to stop? Oh — one little detail: it’s not free and you’re left footing part of the bill. That’s what fueled a health care fraud investigation back in 2015. It started when two insurance carriers filed complaints with a federal watchdog, alleging a medical equipment company was inappropriately billing patients

By the time her boyfriend planted the idea, she’d worked at the Postal Service long enough to know exactly what envelopes to look for. She showed up to work each day playing the part so well, no one suspected a thing. But in just a few months, she managed to steal more than $24 million in checks, making this the largest mail theft conspiracy in the history of the Western District of North Carolina.