COLERAIN TOWNSHIP, Ohio — A 19-year-old man pleaded guilty to robbing a postal service worker at gunpoint, said Kenneth Parker, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio.
Parker said Lamarion Gray pleaded guilty to armed robbery. He is set to be sentenced to 80 to 100 months in prison.
Court documents show that around 4:30 p.m. on July 12, 2023, Gray used a handgun to rob a postal carrier near Cliffside Drive in Colerain Township. Gray stole the carrier's arrow key and vehicle key. Arrow keys provide access to bulk mail collectors, and the mail inside those boxes are used for identity theft and the "washing" of checks, according to inTrustIT cybersecurity consultant David Hatter.
Parker said the armed robbery was caught on surveillance cameras from nearby residences.
Federal agents found both keys when conducting a search warrant of Gray's car, Parker said. They also found gloves and a gold-colored barrel for a gun similar-looking to the ones used in the robbery.
Parker said Gray is one of at least a dozen defendants charged in 2022 in the Southern District of Ohio with crimes related to postal robberies and mail theft.
In November, mail carrier robberies were up in Greater Cincinnati despite numbers falling statewide.
Data analyzed by WCPO partner Journal-News showed mail collection box thefts have dropped by 47% year over year in Ohio and robberies of the keys to open the boxes off of postal carriers had dropped by roughly a third from 34 to 23 over the same time period in the state of Ohio.
Three Cincinnati men were sent to federal prison in December after prosecutors said they stole nearly $175,000 from blue USPS collection boxes for nearly a year.
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