A postman who stashed 75,000 letters – 70,000 of which were direct mailings – in his garden shed, after admitting he was too lazy to deliver them, has been jailed for nine months after being convicted of theft.
John Hodson, 33, was caught after Royal Mail bosses placed tracking devices in his daily round.
Although he stole hundreds of pounds in cash and shopping vouchers to try to cover personal debts of £40,000, police found thousands of unopened letters and packages in his garden shed. These included 70,000 pieces of direct mail, which made up the vast majority of his hoard.
Suspicions were raised after 58 greeting cards went missing in the Prestwich area of Manchester. So Royal Mail’s internal investigations team placed a tracking device inside a package containing a £30 shopping voucher.
Hodson was then caught red-handed on CCTV using the voucher two days later in a branch of JD Sports. Two packages containing other tracking devices were found in his car, while his wallet contained £140 in stolen cash. Inside his house, boxes from many more stolen pieces of mail were found in his kitchen bin.
Judge Peter Davies told the postman he was guilty of a “gross breach of trust”. He said: “The public are entitled to expect a reliable, efficient and trustworthy post service. If postmen are believed to steal then that trust goes. Occasionally somebody comes along and lets the public down and that is what you did.”
The Royal Mail said it had “a zero tolerance approach to any dishonesty and that stance is shared by the overwhelming majority of postmen and women, who are honest and hard-working and who do all they can to protect the mail and deliver it safely”.
A spokesman added: “We will always seek to prosecute the tiny minority of people who abuse their position of trust.”
