Feds accuse mail provider of scheme to steal $40,000 in checks

A U.S. Postal Service mail provider has been indicted for financial institution fraud conspiracy and cash laundering conspiracy for allegedly serving to steal over $40,000 in checks, the Justice Department stated.

Jakia McMorris, 32, of Charlotte, North Carolina, was working as a mail provider on the metropolis’s North Tryon Station. On Sept. 13, 2021, she reported shedding a common USPS key that would open a number of U.S. blue mailboxes.

After that report of misplaced keys, she stopped exhibiting up for work, in keeping with prosecutors.

Authorities didn’t say whether or not Ms. McMorris was nonetheless employed by the U.S. Postal Service. A LinkedIn profile bearing her title says that Ms. McMorris has labored as a provider for USPS in Charlotte from March 2019 to the current.

Co-conspirators are alleged to have used stolen USPS mail keys to open the outside multi-unit mailboxes to entry the checks. These suspects are accused of then depositing the cash into numerous financial institution accounts, together with one belonging to Ms. McMorris.

Ms. McMorris pocketed a part of the proceeds as cost for permitting using her checking account. The cash was then distributed among the many co-conspirators with cash orders, prosecutors stated.

Ms. McMorris first appeared within the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina on Monday. She was launched on an unspecified bond quantity.