A Chicago man is facing more than a dozen felony charges after being arrested Monday for the second time in two weeks for burglary and mail theft, according to the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.
Gustavo Belleza, 36, was first arrested Nov. 7 after Chicago police and postal inspection officers accused him of more than 15 burglaries and mail thefts in Lincoln Park over the past month, according to the police.
Law enforcement said they discovered him breaking into mailboxes and, upon his arrest, discovered he was in possession of false identification documents and real documents not belonging to him, along with stolen mail and approximately 65 bank cards with the names of the victims.
He was arrested again Monday for possession of two more stolen IDs, 10 more bank cards that didn’t belong to him and several burglary tools, according to police.
Since May, postal inspectors have made 109 robbery arrests and 530 mail theft arrests as part of a wave of enforcement across the United States, including Chicago, according to the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.
The measures were part of the Safe Delivery project – implemented by the Postal Service last May as an effort to reduce postal crime and protect its employees – which included installing more blue collection boxes, replacing old locks and increasing of the reward for information leading to arrests, including other things, according to the agency.
The United States Postal Service advises people to pick up their mail as soon as it is delivered and place it in blue collection boxes or deliver it directly to mail carriers as a way to prevent theft and fraud.
“If you attack postal workers, steal mail, or commit other postal crimes, postal inspectors will bring you to justice,” Chief Postal Inspector Gary Barksdale said in a statement. “We ask that the public assist us in our mission.”
