Philly postal worker pleads to Gamefly theft charges
An ex-Philadelphia postal service worker stole 2,200 video games addressed to Philadelphia-area residents who rented them from the video game rental service, GameFly, according to a report in Philadelphia Daily News. Reginald Johnson, a 34 year old who worked as a mail-processing clerk used to unloaded mail from tractor-trailers at the Postal Service distribution center in Philadelphia.. used to. Apparently, while unloading some of those trucks, he loaded up on envelopes containing video games.
You may recall that GameFly complained about the postal service not delivering its game to customers. Well in some large metropolitan areas.. like Philadelphia, the inspector general began conducting investigation to see just what the hell was going on.
One such investigation that took place on Sept. 5 of this year - a surveillance operation of the Philadelphia center using test mailings caught Johnson in the act. According to the paper, federal agents tried to arrest Johnson later that day as he entered his SUV, but Johnson sped off and later crashed his vehicle. After apprehending Johnson, they agents found a bunch of incriminating evidence: 81 GameFly mailings in a duffel bag, an additional 79 GameFly mailings in a back pack, five copies of Wii Sports, 3 copies of Wii Fit, a PlayStation console (we assume the report refers to a PS3), game controllers and - most interesting of all - receipts from GameStop, where Johnson had apparently made a few sales. According to federal prosecutors, Johnson stole $86,000 worth of merchandise between April and September 2008.
Johnson plead guilty in federal district court yesterday and faces 12 to 18 months in prison - and some form of restitution for what he stole, no doubt. He’ll be sentenced on Jan. 13. No word on whether the GameStop that bought Johnson’s purloined packages returned any of them to GameFly.
