The U.S. Postal Service is out to bring justice against former White House street strategist Steve Bannon.
It may not have come as a shock that Bannon, often described as a gripper, was apparently caught up in a scheme to dissuade donors after a crowdfunding campaign that promised to build a wall on the US border -Mexico.
But it came as a surprise to some that the USPS, the same agency that President Donald Trump has tried to shrink ahead of an expected turnout of post-vote votes in November, carried out his arrest on a $ 28 million mega yacht called Lady May off the coast of Connecticut Thursday morning:
The postal service has police? That’s really the envelope print.
– Sawyer Hackett (@SawyerHackett) August 20, 2020
These are not your daily mail carriers: They are part and parcel of an elite police unit known as the US Postal Inspection Service (USPIS), which has been fighting crime since the postal fraud statute was introduced in 1872. There are about 1,200 such postal inspectors carrying weapons, making arrests, conducting federal searches, and serving consignments. All agents must complete a 16-week training program that covers firearms, physical fitness, and defense tactics. In 2019, they made 5,759 arrests and 4,995 convictions related to postal crimes, according to USPS.
‘They say,’ Oh, you’re a lot like the FBI. ‘And I like to tell them,’ No, the FBI is a lot like us, ” says one USPIS agent in a recruiting video:
They often work with other federal, state and local authorities to investigate e-theft, fraud, identity theft, drug cases, opioid investigations, lottery scams, and more. Research sometimes spans years.
In Bannon’s case, they collaborated with Audrey Strauss, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. It is not immediately clear why the USPIS was involved, as none of the charges against Bannon – conspiracy to launder money and wire fraud – appear to be directly related to the email, and the USPIS declined to comment. to give about her investigation into Bannon, which is ongoing.
The inspector in charge of the Department of Post Inspectors in New York, Philip Bartlett, said in a statement that Bannon’s indictment should send a message to other fraudsters: “No one is above the law.”
“The suspects were apparently involved in fraud when they misrepresented the actual use of donated funds,” Bartlett said. “However, not only did they show up for donors, they planned to hide their misuse of funds by creating scam bills and accounts to know donations and cover their crimes, without showing up for the law or the truth.”
Clearly, the USPS not only sells stamps – it also acts to prosecute crime.
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