Poulsbo postal worker suspected of stealing money from cards

Irmgard Castillo, of Poulsbo, put 10 $1 bills in a birthday card for her 5-year-old great-granddaughter last month and mailed it off in a bright-green envelope to the girl's home San Mateo, Calif.

The 82-year-old Castillo, who has been ill with cancer, said she sent the little stack of bills because her granddaughter "would think that it was a lot of money."

"I didn't have very much, and she's a little girl," she said.

But weeks went by and Castillo's great-granddaughter never called to thank her.

Castillo didn't know what happened to the card until federal investigators told her that fragments of the card — including a piece with her address — were found in the garbage of a Poulsbo Post Office custodian who is suspected of stealing cash from birthday and holiday cards traveling through the U.S. mail.

"Now [Castillo] understood why her great-granddaughter didn't call her to thank her for the card," an investigator wrote after interviewing the woman.

A federal search warrant unsealed in U.S. District Court in Tacoma last week details an investigation into the thefts, which included a postal "sting" that involved mailing a card equipped with a special transmitter to alert agents to tampering.

The investigation began after dozens of area residents complained to the Poulsbo postmaster about missing mail. In the first two months of this year, the postmaster told investigators, 42 customers had complained about approximately 94 greeting cards and letters missing from the mail. Most were sent from the post-office lobby drop-slot or the mailbox out front.

The 22-year custodian has not been charged, although she has been placed on leave, according to the warrant. The U.S. Attorney's Office in Seattle declined to comment on the case.

The suspect had also been one of several "persons of interest" in the unsolved 2002 theft of an $11,000 bank check stolen from the same post office, according to the warrant.

John Masters, the special agent in charge of the U.S. Postal Service's Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in Seattle, said he could not comment on the investigation or the status of the employee.

"This type of behavior ... is not a common occurrence; it is an anomaly," Masters said in a written statement.

During the probe, investigators mailed 25 greeting cards from Poulsbo to addresses controlled by the U.S. Postal Service's Office of Inspector General. Only eight of the cards reached their destination, and the custodian was on duty during all of the dates the cards went missing, according to the document.

Agents searched the trash taken from the custodian's home and found, in addition to the fragment of the envelope mailed by Castillo, "the metal mechanics of approximately nine musical greeting cards."

On Feb. 23, according to the warrant, OIG Special Agent Anne Stanek recorded the serial numbers of three $20 bills and placed them in a pink envelope with a card and bearing a birthday cake sticker. The card was left in the gurney containing the lobby mail drop.

The card also contained a tiny transmitter.

About a half-hour later, the warrant said, the transmitter went into "alarm mode," which meant the card had been opened.

When confronted, the custodian at first denied any knowledge of the card but later said she sometimes opened cards to listen to the musical cards.

The $60 was found in her front pocket and the card behind a bucket in the custodial closet.

The crime of theft of mail by a postal employee is a federal offense punishable by up to five years in prison.

Mike Carter: 206-464-3706 or mcarter@seattletimes.com