Former Kansas post office employee fined for destroying mail containing cash

A former postal worker has been fined after admitting to destroying mail and presumably stealing the money inside.

Dennis Tapscott, age 24, of Emporia, was sentenced Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Wichita to a $500 fine, $575 in restitution and a $25 special assessment fee. He pleaded guilty last week to one count of delaying mail.

Tapscott admitted as part of a plea deal with federal prosecutors that he opened and destroyed mail containing cash that was intended for other people. The crimes happened between August 2019 and January 2020, primarily in Lyon County. At the time, he was a contract driver for the U.S. Postal Service.

Court documents did not explicitly state whether Tapscott kept the money from the mail he destroyed, but he was ordered to repay the victims of the crime.

A USPS investigation found that Tapscott destroyed mail sent to 12 individuals in Hamilton, Eureka, Olpe, Virgil and Madison. Losses in the apparent mail theft ranged from $10 to $150 per piece of mail.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office announced the grand jury indictment in October. The maximum penalties in the case were up to a year in federal prison and a fine of up to $100,000.

This story was originally published June 1, 2021 at 9:15 PM.