A 20-year-old man held the key to mail thefts in Ballantyne and south Charlotte, feds say
While other mail thieves in Charlotte operated on an alley-to-alley, mailbox-to-mailbox blueprint, Kyree Corbett thought he had a better plan.
He stole from the post offices themselves.
According to a new federal indictment, the 20-year-old Charlotte man was able to streamline his mail-theft process with the help of a U.S. Postal Service master key, which he and his accomplices obtained during the armed robbery of a mail carrier last December.
Over the next six months, Corbett and his companions used the key to open collection boxes and steal the mail tubs from post offices and business parks across south Charlotte, the court document says.
Two of the crew’s favorite targets were the post offices at Ballantyne Station, which the conspirators hit six times between late December and May 30; and the South Providence Station on Golf Links Drive, which was struck twice, the indictment claims.
Corbett was arrested last week and was being held Monday in the Mecklenburg County jail. According to the indictment, he is charged with robbery and possession of U.S. property and conspiracy. His attorney, Federal Public Defender John Parke Davis, declined comment Monday to the The Charlotte Observer.
Mail theft in Charlotte
Mail theft, according to the Postal Service, is a thriving criminal enterprise, having increased 600% between 2017 and 2020.
The U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the USPS police force, made 1,622 arrests that led to 1,321 convictions in 2020, according to its annual report.
In Charlotte’s case, Corbett’s indictment and arrest mark at least the fourth major mail-theft case filed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the past two years.
▪ In January 2020, Eric Magana was sentenced to 42 months in prison in connection on a one-person mail-theft ring that stole at least $550,000 from some 1,300 victims. His take included everything from credit cards to tickets to the Broadway musical “Hamilton.”
Charles Morgan Harrell awaits sentencing on a bank fraud charge related to her stealing mail in three states. Locally, Harrell was the “kindly grandma” that pilfered mailboxes in multiple south Charlotte neighborhood before her arrest last October.
▪ Earlier this month, Soheil Akhavan Rezaie, 37, pleaded guilty to targeting mail in several Charlotte neighborhoods that led to $150,000 in damages from stolen credit cards, forged checks and other bank fraud. He started his spree while on supervised release from an earlier mail-theft conviction, the Observer previously reported.
Key to stolen mail
Corbett’s theft of the postal key enabled the theft ring to drive to “multiple post offices and business parts in quick succession” to acquire large amounts of mail in single stops, his indictment alleges.
How much mail — and the estimated amount of damages to the public — are not spelled out in the indictment. But two days after robbing the postal carrier of the key, Corbett and the other conspirators struck the post offices in Ballantyne and South Providence for the first time, the document says.
After taking January and February off, they hit Ballantyne Station post office once in March and twice in April, the indictment alleges. They went back to the facility on Ballantyne Commons Parkway on May 2 and May 30, slipping in a visit to the South Providence post office on May 9.
In early June, Corbett was arrested on a state charge of possession of a stolen weapon. It is not known if the weapon is the one used to rob the postal carrier last December.
This story was originally published June 28, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
