Floral Park residents have been plagued by mailbox thieves for the past few years, according to the village’s police department.
Last month, the Floral Park Police Department arrested two men, Alenndhe Del Rosario and Omar Antonio Maldonado, who allegedly possessed $100,000 of stolen checks from the mailbox in front of the Floral Park Post Office.
They were both charged with criminal possession of stolen property, criminal possession of forged instruments, possession of burglar’s tools and criminal trespass after being arrested on July 20, according to Floral Park Police Department Lt. Thomas McCarthy.
The man driving the car, Del Rosario, was also charged with reckless driving and unlawfully fleeing police, as a chase broke out once police realized the men may have had stolen mail in their possession, McCarthy said.
“There have been issues going back for several years. I don’t think that they’re all connected,” McCarthy said. “It’s just an ongoing problem that we’ve seen.”
Multiple Floral Park residents have filed Facebook posts in community groups over the past few weeks commiserating about mailbox theft they have experienced.
“This happened to me last August, and the thieves were able to whitewash my checks and steal $12,000 from me,” Jacqueline McKeown Evans wrote. “Fortunately, [my] bank refunded the money, but the thieves got away with this crime…I had to close my account and open a new one.”
“I wrote a check for $2,100 and they washed it to read $21,000,” another resident wrote. “I was horrified.”
Several others added that they’ve experienced similar incidents while living in the village over the past few years.
McCarthy said thieves have improved their techniques over the years and are able to circumvent many mailbox locking devices by using glue traps. Instead, he said, residents looking to send checks securely should do so by bringing them directly to a post office or by using a specific type of pen.
“The advice that we give to people is to make sure that they use the gel pens,” McCarthy said. “They are a good deterrent instead of using a regular ballpoint ink pen. That’s probably the best way to secure your checks.”
“What the thieves usually do is use some type of solution to wash the checks. They’ll wash the signature and they’ll wash the dollar amount, and that’s provided, then they’ll use their own pen to ink in their figures,” McCarthy said. “There are actually specific pens that will say they’re not impossible to wash, but they are much more difficult to wash…It will be specified on the package.”
McCarthy also suggested residents send money online instead of through the mail.
Police ask that people report any instances of suspected theft as soon as possible.
