Postal worker steals over $1.5 million in checks from letters, feds say

A U.S. Postal Service employee has been charged with stealing more than $1.5 million in checks and fraudulently securing a pandemic relief loan, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of Missouri.

Anthony Virdure II, 29, was charged on Wednesday with three counts of mail theft and one count of wire fraud. Virdure is accused of stealing checks while employed at a USPS distribution center located at 1720 Market Street, St. Louis, where he had access to all first-class mail processed through the facility.

In addition to the mail theft, Virdure is also charged with obtaining $20,832 from the Pandemic Protection Program (PPP) in 2021 through fraudulent means. He received the loan under the guise of running a business called Virdure Dynamics, which he claimed was a tobacco store.

However, investigators found that the information Virdure provided on the loan application, including the business income and address, was false. The address listed on the application was later found to be his grandmother’s home.

Virdure now faces serious legal consequences. The wire fraud charge carries a maximum penalty of up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The mail theft charges could result in a sentence of up to five years in prison per count, along with fines of up to $250,000 for each charge.