Postal worker charged in theft of $600K in stamps

A U.S. Postal Service worker has been charged with stealing more than $600,000 in stamps from the post office in Elkridge where he worked, federal court documents revealed.

Postal inspectors were led to Marvin Foster after starting an investigation into Kyle Mathias, who allegedly was selling Forever Stamps on eBay for less than their face value, the inspectors wrote in a sworn statement. Mathias has been charged with conspiring with Foster to sell the stolen stamps.

As the investigation proceeded, the inspectors learned that from at least January 2007 through December 2008, a pattern of thefts of stamps at the Elkridge Post Office had emerged, the statement said.

According to the statement: On Dec. 1, the inspectors placed a hidden camera in the stamp stock room at Elkridge. Three days later at 2:10 a.m., Foster appeared on camera stealing nine bricks of Forever Stamps valued at $7,560. He appeared again Dec. 8 when he filled a sack with an unknown number of stamps. An audit of the Elkridge Post Office found that between August and Dec. 9, a total of $497,000 in stamps had been stolen, the statement said.

As a window clerk, Foster had keys granting him access to the building and the storage rooms, the statement said. Between mid-December and March, $130,000 more in stamps disappeared from the office.

At one point, a postal inspector used a special instrument on several bricks that left marks that can't be seen with the naked eye. The inspector then allegedly purchased one of the bricks at less than face value from Mathias through eBay. The brick that arrived in the inspector's mailbox had the hidden markings on it, the statement said.

Later, the inspectors would attach a Global Positioning System tracking device to Foster's car, the statement said. Foster, the tracking device revealed, visited Mathias on several occasions in February and March.

Since 2000, Mathias has received $676,264 in his Paypal account from eBay transactions, the statement said. In 2008 and thus far in 2009, Mathias has not reported an income.

"His only source of income appears to be the sale of goods on eBay, which includes U.S. postal stamps," the inspectors wrote.

Mathias and Foster were released on their own recognizance after being arrested Wednesday.

(Copyright 2009 by The Examiner. All Rights Reserved.)