Can you go to prison for mailbox fishing

| by Max Soni

Can you go to prison for mailbox fishing?

Thanks for visiting Spodek Law Group. We’re a second-generation law firm managed by Todd Spodek – with over 40 years of combined experience handling federal criminal cases that other attorneys won’t touch. You’ve probably heard about some of our cases, like representing Anna Delvey in the Netflix series, handling the Ghislaine Maxwell juror misconduct situation, or defending clients in the Alec Baldwin stalking case. If you’re reading this article, you’re likely facing mail theft charges or someone you care about is – and you need straight answers about what prison time actually looks like for mailbox fishing.

Yes, you can absolutely go to prison for mailbox fishing. Federal prison. Not county jail for a few months – actual federal prison under 18 U.S.C. § 1708 with sentences ranging from three years to over a decade depending on what prosecutors decide to charge. The statute itself carries up to five years, but that’s never the whole story.

What mailbox fishing actually means in federal court

Mailbox fishing – that’s when someone uses a device covered in adhesive or sticky material to pull mail out of USPS collection boxes before postal workers retrieve it. In Mobile, Alabama, federal agents found “fishing” devices covered in rat trap glue inside postal collection boxes in March 2023. The defendant’s fingerprints were on those devices. He got 36 months in federal prison in July 2024 for bank fraud and aggravated identity theft involving checks he stole from the mail.

That case shows you what federal prosecutors actually do with mailbox fishing cases. They don’t just charge mail theft – they charge every crime that flows from it. Bank fraud when you deposit stolen checks. Aggravated identity theft when you use someone else’s account information. Each charge carries its own prison term, and some of them stack.

In Princeton, Indiana, investigators watched a couple open USPS collection boxes with an arrow key at 4:30 in the morning, sort through mail, drive off with stolen items. Six different occasions. They weren’t just fishing – they had a key, which made it worse. Combined sentence: 14 years in federal prison for a $2 million mail theft scheme plus firearms offenses.

The federal sentencing math that determines your prison time

Federal judges don’t just pick a number. They use the United States Sentencing Guidelines – a point system that calculates your prison range based on what you did and who you are. For mail theft and fraud cases, the base offense level starts at 6 or 7 points. Seven points if the crime carries a statutory maximum of 20 years, six points otherwise.

Then the loss amount drives everything. Steal between $5,000 and $10,000? Add 2 points. Steal over $7 million? Add 20 points. The guidelines treat financial loss as the primary factor in determining how serious your crime was – which means that sticky mouse trap pulling out a handful of checks can turn into a Guidelines calculation in the double digits if those checks total six figures.

Prosecutors in 2025 are stacking charges. A typical mailbox fishing case gets charged as mail theft under 18 U.S.C. § 1708, bank fraud when checks are deposited, identity theft when personal information is used, and aggravated identity theft under 18 U.S.C. § 1028A. That last one – aggravated identity theft – carries a mandatory minimum sentence of two years consecutive to whatever else you get. Consecutive means it runs after your other sentence, not at the same time.

So if the Guidelines put you at 36 months for the fraud, and you have the aggravated identity theft mandatory minimum, you’re looking at 60 months minimum before any departure or variance arguments.

Why federal prosecutors treat this as organized crime

You might think mailbox fishing is petty theft – someone grabbed a few letters, maybe got some checks, tried to cash them. Federal prosecutors don’t see it that way in 2025. They see organized criminal activity targeting financial institutions.

The DOJ announced multiple cases this year involving USPS employees stealing mail. In Philadelphia, two former USPS employees were charged in a scheme involving stolen U.S. Treasury checks with a face value exceeding $80 million. In Washington, D.C., a postal worker was convicted of stealing over $1.6 million in checks from the mail. In Kansas, five former USPS employees were indicted for mail theft.

When postal employees are involved – people with access to mail as part of their job – the federal government views it as a betrayal of public trust. When civilians are fishing mail out of collection boxes, prosecutors argue it’s targeting the integrity of the postal system itself.

The checks are the problem. Mailbox fishing cases almost always involve checks because that’s what criminals are looking for – negotiable instruments they can alter, deposit, or sell. Once checks enter the picture, bank fraud charges follow. Once bank accounts are compromised, identity theft charges follow. The crime cascades.

What actually happens when you get caught

Federal agents don’t usually catch you in the act. They catch you later – through fingerprints on fishing devices, through surveillance footage, through banking records showing deposits of stolen checks, through cooperating witnesses who bought checks from you.

In the Mobile case, agents recovered fishing devices from collection boxes and ran the fingerprints. Match. Arrest. Indictment. Guilty plea. Sentencing.

In the Princeton case, Evansville Police Department officers conducted surveillance on local USPS collection boxes and watched the defendants open boxes with an arrow key on six different occasions. That’s federal agents building a case with direct observation, multiple instances, establishing a pattern.

When you’re arrested for a federal mail theft offense, you’re not getting released on your own recognizance in most cases. The magistrate judge will consider whether you’re a flight risk and whether you pose a danger to the community. If checks were involved – if there’s financial fraud – prosecutors will argue you’re a risk to continue the offense if released.

Pretrial detention is common in these cases, particularly when the loss amount is high or when there are multiple victims. You’re sitting in a federal detention center waiting for trial or waiting to resolve your case through a plea agreement.

Your criminal history multiplies everything

The Sentencing Guidelines don’t just look at what you did – they look at who you are. Specifically, they look at your criminal history. The Guidelines assign you a Criminal History Category from I to VI based on prior convictions, and that category intersects with your offense level on the Sentencing Table to produce a Guidelines range in months.

A defendant with no prior record – Criminal History Category I – at offense level 15 is looking at 18 to 24 months. That same offense level 15 for someone in Criminal History Category VI? 41 to 51 months. Your past matters enormously.

If you’ve got prior theft convictions, prior fraud convictions, prior identity theft – prosecutors will argue for enhancements and upward departures. Judges will see a pattern. The probation officer writing your presentence investigation report will flag your criminal history as a factor weighing against leniency.

When cooperation might reduce your sentence

In many mailbox fishing cases, you’re not working alone. You’re selling checks to someone else, or someone’s selling them to you, or there’s a network of people involved in altering checks, cashing checks, moving money.

Federal prosecutors offer cooperation agreements – what they call substantial assistance under U.S.S.G. § 5K1.1 or Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 35(b). If you provide information that leads to the prosecution of other people, the government can file a motion asking the judge to depart below the Guidelines range or below a mandatory minimum.

Cooperation isn’t automatic leniency. You have to provide information that’s actually useful – names, locations, methods, bank accounts, other criminal activity. You have to testify if needed. You have to be truthful, completely truthful, because lying to federal agents or in court is a separate felony.

The Mobile defendant who got 36 months – we don’t know if he cooperated or not, but that sentence suggests either a cooperation agreement or a fast-track guilty plea with acceptance of responsibility. Three years for bank fraud and aggravated identity theft is on the lower end when you consider the mandatory minimum for aggravated identity theft alone is two years.

At Spodek Law Group – we’ve negotiated cooperation agreements in federal cases where our clients faced decades and walked out with years. It’s about timing, it’s about the value of what you bring, and it’s about having lawyers who know how to present your cooperation in a way that maximizes the benefit. Todd Spodek has handled federal cases for many, many, years – including cases where cooperation was the difference between a Guidelines sentence and something manageable.

Why you need a federal criminal defense lawyer immediately

If you’re under investigation for mailbox fishing, if you’ve been contacted by postal inspectors, if you’ve been arrested – you’re in federal criminal territory now, and this is not the time to talk your way out of it or hope it goes away.

Federal prosecutors don’t bring weak cases. By the time you’re indicted, they’ve already built their case – they have evidence, they have witnesses, they have documents. Your window to shape the outcome is narrow, and it closes fast.

We’ve represented clients in federal mail fraud cases, bank fraud cases, identity theft cases. Our managing partner, Todd Spodek, is a second-generation criminal defense attorney who’s handled cases that made national headlines – cases other lawyers said were unwinnable. We represented Anna Delvey in a case that became a Netflix series. We handled the Ghislaine Maxwell juror misconduct issue. We defend people when the stakes are highest.

The worst thing you can do is talk to federal agents without a lawyer present. They’re not trying to help you. They’re building a case. Every statement you make can be used against you, and you won’t know what evidence they already have until it’s too late to take back what you said.

Call us at Spodek Law Group – we’re available 24/7 because federal arrests don’t happen on a schedule. We’ll review your case, explain what you’re actually facing, and map out a defense strategy that’s based on reality, not optimism. We focus on getting our clients the best possible outcome, whether that’s through negotiation, cooperation, or taking the case to trial.

Mailbox fishing might sound like a minor offense, but federal prosecutors don’t treat it that way in 2025 – and neither should you.