Well, the postal service is trying to get a handle on
this wave of crime. Criminals are after the mail
because of what's inside envelopes, things like
personal checks. These crimes often begin with the
attack of a letter carrier and a demand for them to
hand over their mailbox keys. This is happening more
and more all over the country. Us mail carrier.
Jeremiah Grant was working his route in Oklahoma City
two years ago when a masked man suddenly approached
and I turned around to greet him. He had a gun pointed
at me. I just kind of froze. And what did he say Uh,
give me your keys He didn't want your mail. He didn'
ask for money. He wanted your keys. That's all he asked
for. They're known as arrow keys in the postal service.
They can open virtually all the mailboxes in a delivery
area. They're so valuable. It's against federal law for
anyone unauthorized to be in possession of one. But
that hasn't been enough to stop a nationwide wave of
robberies like this one in Brooklyn and here in Houston
by criminals trying to get their hands on a precious
arrow key in Philadelphia. This surveillance
captures a man on a busy street corner who says he has
a gun threatening to shoot a postal worker unless he
hands over his arrow key. And in Fort Worth Texas
police body, camera video we obtain shows a shaken up
letter carrier still holding her mail. Minutes after a
man shoved a gun at her and took her key. I saw this
man come up and I heard a click and I looked up and he
had a gun he demanded for my arrow key. Our Scripps
news investigation found the violent crimes are on the
rise in 2021 132 arrow keys were snatched away from
mail carriers by last year. That number had more than
tripled to 418. When our data team mapped the location
of all the robberies. We found reports of arrow keys
stolen from letter carriers in 39 states and Washington
DC. So what do criminals do with these arrow keys My
advice to consumers is that few people have tracked the
answer to that question more closely than Professor
David Mian. He runs the evidence based cybersecurit
research group at Georgia State University. His team
specializes in monitoring online underground markets
that criminals use to sell illegal goods. Criminals.
We're selling those arrow keys for range of prices
starting from 1000 to $7000. 1 key could be worth
thousands of dollars, thousands of dollars. Maman
showed us some of the illicit online markets. He and
his team have infiltrated, givi us a rare look at
where arrow keys commonly end up. So these are some of
the arrow keys. It's highly possible that these two
arrow keys came from a mail carrier. This one is
offering to deliver you the key same day. One of the
keys we saw going for $4500 included a specific zip
code. Another one had NY and NJ scrawled below it. This
is an arrow key which will open New York mailboxes. Y
see the price $1200. That's right. Arrow keys are so
valuable because once thieves have one, they can
quickly steal troves of mail. An attorney in Charlotte,
North Carolina shared with Scripps News. This
surveillance video of two masked men approaching a
cluster mailbox outside her office. Watch as they use
an arrow key to open these rows of mailboxes belongi
to multiple businesses. In less than a minute. They
load a black trash bag full of everything inside.
They're after your checks. Mama told us and they often
end up on the same online market selling those arr
keys. Well, check this out, man, this is the $3 million
IRS check. Unbelievable. There are also handwrit
personal checks for sale from all over the country for
much smaller amounts that crooks can alter and then
cash for a higher sum. This one is very fresh as well.
Let's see. $35. My expectation is that these $35 will
become hundreds of dollars. Another check. Myman shows
us had been dropped in the mail just days before by
someone trying to pay a plumber for toilet repair.
Chances are these people have no idea that their checks
have been stolen from the mail and are now for sale.
Unfortunately, you're right, th job of preventing all
this mail theft falls to the US. Postal inspection
service headquartered in Washington. That's where we
met. Deputy Chief Peter Rendina. Is there something
that is making the mail more enticing for criminal
than in years past. There's been a change. We're seeing
that these mail thieves are now much more organized,
whether it's financial uh medicine care packages. The
criminals know that they can access that if they can
get access to the mail. The postal service launch
project safe Delivery a year ago, installing more
secure blue collection boxes in high theft areas and
replacing 28,000 arrow keys with electronic locks. But
an inspector general's report released last fall said
much more needs to be done. It said the postal
inspection service still needs to finalize a mail theft
strategy and should be requiring specialized traini
for postal inspectors assigned to investigate mail
theft. This report seems to be saying that your office
is not doing enough to tackle mail theft to be a United
States postal inspector. You ha to go through a basic
training academy they work on male theft techniques.
We're doing surges of resources where we're seeing th
most crime. We've done a number of city surges
specifically in Chicago, San Francisco and cities
across Ohio in the past five months, both letter
carrier robberies and complaint about male theft have
dropped while arrests are up. Do you have the resources
You need to really get a handle on this problem. Yes,
we do. But our letter carriers are part of your
community. If you see someone suspicious following th
carrier or a vehicle that keeps circling the area while
your carrier is there. I'm asking you call 911 letter
carriers have been holding rallies across the country
to draw attention to the threat they face on the street.
Jeremiah Grant spoke about being one of six letter
carriers attacked in Oklahoma since 2022 during the
robbery. I felt an overwhelming fear unlike anythi
that I had ever experienced before. After month
reliving the trauma of that day Grant gave up his job
as a letter carrier. He now works as a clerk inside a
local post office. I don't feel comfortable being on
the street carrying the mail. You really liked being a
letter carrier. I did. I did. It was a great job. I
loved it. Just the freedom and kind of flexibility to
just be out there on our own all day. This robbery
changed that. Absolutely. Um You know, this robbery
changed everything and it's not just that these arrow
keys are getting stolen. They are also getting lost
data that we obtained from the US. Postal Inspection
Service says that since 2018, more than 8000 of these
postal service arrow keys have disappeared from within
inside the postal service. The inspector general says
that accountability has been a major challenge when it
comes to these arrow keys. And since then, that report
in the fall, postal Service says that they are trying
to boost accountability. And that another major goal
again is to replace as many of those old school locks
with electronic versions. But that is very expensive.
One estimate says it would cost $2.6 billion to replace
all of those locks. But at the end of the day, that may
be what it takes to keep criminals out of the mail.