1 Photo
Suffolk County Police Chief of Detectives John Rowan , Commissioner Rodney Harrison and Inspector Darrell Simmons discussed the rise in mail theft at a recent press conference. COURTESY SCPD
Why hasn’t Grandma’s annual Christmas check arrived? Why are you getting a late notice from PSEG Long Island when you mailed your payment by check two weeks ago?
That flag raised on your mailbox to tell the mail carrier there are outgoing letters inside also could be telling thieves that the box is a candidate for looting.
Missing checks may have fallen prey to a scam known as “check washing” — soaking a check in chemicals to remove the ink, and then changing the payee and dollar amount of the check — and officials say the crime is becoming increasingly prevalent in the region.
Last week, Suffolk County Police Commissioner Rodney Harrison reported some 40 county residents — in Huntington, Melville and Dix Hills — have been victimized, as reports of the fraud ticked up substantially since August.
It’s happening on the South Fork, too.
On October 31, an East Quogue victim told Southampton Town Police that someone removed a check made out for $3,200 from her Rosebriar Lane mailbox, altered it to read $18,897.22 and tried to cash it. Alerted by her financial institution, she was able to stop payment.
Often banks do contact their customers when someone tries to cash a suspicious check for a hefty sum.
Southampton Village Police met with a victim of check fraud on September 9. The woman reported writing a $3,762.26 check to one entity in August and subsequently learning that it had been altered to read $10,762.26, and made out to a different entity.
In another case, someone stole outgoing mail, which included a number of checks, from a mailbox on Wyandanch Lane. The victim told Southampton Village Police on August 22 that the envelopes had been put in the box the previous day, and the following afternoon her daughter found the envelopes crumpled up on the side of the road. Some were empty, some contained payment stubs, but the checks were all missing.
In Quogue Village, two people were victimized. The first case dates to August. Three checks taken from a mailbox on Quaquanantuck Lane were rewritten to total over $34,000. A second case affecting a Stone Lane resident in September saw a check rewritten to $18,450.78.
Quogue Village Police believe the original checks were stolen from the residential mailboxes, then “washed” and rewritten to a new payee with a new amount.
So far, police in Westhampton Beach, East Hampton and Sag Harbor say they haven’t seen any cases.
Harrison reported that in one up-island case, a $100 check was altered to read $52,000. The scammers, he said at a press conference on November 1, “cash in on your money.”
Both incoming and outgoing mail has been taken. Thieves have even stolen from boxes at post offices. The crime, Harrison said, “is touching everyone.” No demographic is unscathed.
According to the U.S. Postal Service website, postal inspectors recover more than $1 billion in counterfeit checks and money orders every year.
How does the scam work?
Once the thieves have taken mail containing a check from the box, they put a piece of tape or a sticker over the signature. Signature secured, they soak the check in a chemical bath. Regular household chemicals can do the trick. So, too, can clear correction fluids, or even a high-performance eraser, especially if the victim uses an “erasable” ballpoint pen.
Once the handwritten ink comes off, the scammers hang the check to dry. The result is a signed blank check that can be altered to suit the fraudster. Some scammers will even use copiers or scanners to print fake copies of a check.
A majority of the checks are deposited via mobile app, although in-person transactions have occurred, police said.
Luckily, there is an array of ways to safeguard checks.
“I advise people to never put their checks in their outgoing mailbox, or the outdoor mail collection bins,” Lieutenant Dan Hartman of the Quogue Village Police said this week. “I only tell people to put their mail directly inside the post office secure box.”
Never leave mail in the mailbox overnight and, when using the neighborhood postal receptacle for outgoing letters, deposit your mail right before the posted pick-up time, officials say. Be sure, when going on vacation, to have a friend or neighbor grab your mail, or ask the post office to hold it for you.
The Postal Service recommends making the transition to online banking to eliminate the need for using paper checks, and also suggests picking up orders of new checks at your local bank branch rather than having them shipped.
And if you have to write a check, avoid using regular ink, as it’s easy to wash. Use an indelible black ink.
“In general, people have to be more vigilant on their properties,” Detective Sergeant Herman Lamison of the Southampton Village Police said. “If they see anything suspicious, the best course of action is to call us, even if it seems trivial. Please call us. You’re not being a nuisance at all. We need to get eyes in the area.”
