Hundreds of pieces of mail were found in a north Tulsa gutter Monday morning.
Rosalia Aragon and workers with Serenity Funeral Home on Admiral found a white post office box filled with opened mail, missing documents and money.
“Some of them were marriage certificates, birthday cards from grandma,” she said. “Bills where they were paying their credit cards. It looks like they had submitted their payments to pay their credit card bill and stuff like that.”
Aragon claims she called several post offices and received no intentions to respond, until a manager at the Northeast Station near Independence and Darlington responded to pick-up the box.
When 2NEWS showed up there were still several pieces of mail and checks inside the gutter. We tracked down three of those victims who told us they dropped off their mail at the mailbox outside the Northeast Station sometime on Sunday.
“I mailed all of them at the post office over on Admiral,” Joseph Hoppes said. “I always make a point to mail it there, I mailed another bill with that too, a gas bill.” The USPS says it’s investigating the case, but would not say where the mail was taken from.”
Aragon was told they would notify the victims, but she’s worried it might be late for some of them if their payments are late.
“One of them was a marriage certificate that was being mailed back to the county to be registered so they already signed it,” she said. “It’s their original marriage certificate.”
She tried to track down the name on it, Annie Naomi Parker, without any success.
2NEWS checked the the mail box where the victims reported dropping off their mail, and it appears to have small nicks near the lock. 2NEWS continues to wait for answers from the USPS.
In order to prevent mail theft, U.S. postal inspectors recommend customers do the following to protect themselves from thieves:
– Customers who utilize the blue collection boxes to send outgoing mail should consider not depositing mail after the last posted collection time.
– If customers have concerns about security in their neighborhood, they can place mail in a collection box in another area, in a secure receptacle at their place of business, or deposited in an outgoing mail slot inside a post office.
– Never send cash or coins in the mail. Use checks or money orders only.
– If customers see someone suspicious near a mailbox or see them steal mail, they should call police and notify the U.S. Postal Inspection Service at 877-876-2455.