SOUTHLAKE (1080 KRLD) - Southlake DPS officers make an unusual discovery during a traffic stop over the weekend.
In the early morning hours of Sunday, officers pulled over Joshua Albright on N. Carroll Ave. just north of SR 114 for speeding and not having a license plate.
Officers say the license that Albright produced was fake.
They noticed an open can of beer inside the vehicle, so they did some more searching -- and they found scores of stolen pieces of mail.
"Over 150 pieces of mail from 39 unique addresses in our surrounding communities," says Ofc. Brad Uptmore, Southlake DPS spokesman.
Most of the stolen mail was from Colleyville; others were from Irving, Carrollton and Addison.
While much of the stolen mail was junk mail, some of it contained sensitive information.
"Officers noted that there were a bunch of 1099s and W-2 and other tax-related documents that were included in this," says Ofc. Uptmore, "A lot of stuff that's ripe for forgery or fraud down the road, if this guy had made off with it."
Albright is now facing felony charges.
"He was charged with mail theft of 30 to 50 addresses and also possession of a controlled substance, because they had found some methamphetamine in his socks," Uptmore says.
Southlake DPS is now working to return the mail to their rightful recipients.
"They're all individually packaged in sealed-up bags and identified," says Uptmore; "and obviously, we have their addresses."
Uptmore says mail theft usually spikes this time of the year.
"With tax time coming up, this is the time that they're really ramping up to try to get that information, because they know that those documents are going to be making their way to your homes," he says.
