In Charlotte, NC a federal indictment was unsealed on October 19, 2023 in federal court charging Dontavis Truesdale, 27, with conspiracy to commit financial institution fraud and theft of mail by a postal employee. Dontavis is an employee with the United States Postal Service in Charlotte, he is accused of heading a $1.9 million check theft ring.
From November 2022 to April 2023, Dontavis worked as a processing clerk at the Ballantyne Post Office.
Watch video of a postal employee being robbed of his mail master key. The indictment alleges that Dontavis used his position as mail processing clerk to steal hundreds of checks of businesses that maintained post office boxes. The checks totaled $1.9 million.
The indictment further alleges that Dontavis sold the stolen checks to other people who committed bank fraud; those people then deposited the stolen checks into bank accounts they controlled, and then quickly removed the funds before the banks detected the fraud.
Dontavis was arrested in October 2023 and released on bond following his initial appearance in court. Click here to see the many mail carriers arrested in Charlotte.
The bank fraud conspiracy charge carries a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison. The charge of theft by a postal employee has a statutory maximum penalty of five years in prison for each of the five counts charged in the indictment.
