Officials: Brooklyn Residents Among Postal Workers Arrested for Stealing Marijuana Packages

By Heather Doyle

Eight postal workers, including two from Brooklyn, face mail theft and drug conspiracy charges after stealing massive amounts of marijuana, according to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York.

While processing mail at the Logistical and Distribution Priority Mail Processing Center in Bethpage on Long Island, the workers allegedly stole packages that seemed suspicious and relabeled parcels to send them to different places, attorneys said.

Instead of alerting police about the suspicious packages, workers took parcels from the processing line and placed them in a nearby hallway, officials said. They then took the packages out of the building and brought them to a nearby business park, attorneys said.

The workers were also seen “overlabeling” parcels by taking packages out of line, attaching new address labels, and placing them back in line for delivery to a new destination, officials said.

Between September and November, agents seized 12 overlabeled packages and found they contained more than 129 pounds of marijuana, officials said. The total street value of the drugs is between $100,000 and $930,000.

The people arrested are:

• Kempleton Nash, 29, of Cambria Heights
• Eugene Williams, 37, of Brentwood
• Timothy Marshall, 28, of Far Rockaway
• Jerrod Rollerson, 25, of Hempstead
• Tanicha Grenald-Allen, 36, of Brooklyn
• Sherwin Parkes, 36, of Brooklyn
• Lloyd Johnson, 34, of St. Albans
• Jose Hurtado, 43, of North Bellmore

“Abusing their positions of trust as postal employees, the defendants allegedly stole hundreds of packages to further their drug dealing efforts,” United States Attorney Loretta Lynch said in a statement. “We and our partners in law enforcement are committed to ensuring that government employees act with the degree of integrity that the public expects and deserves.”

The defendants are set to appear in federal court in Central Islip Wednesday afternoon.