Buried in the Mail Sacks

A father and son ran a bulk-mailing business in Vermont. Customers, mostly companies advertising seminars, sent brochures to be addressed, sorted and posted, and prepaid the postage into a separate account. Prosecutors said an employee hid higher-rate mail inside sacks of cheaper bulk mail, false postal forms were filed showing the lower rate, and customers got receipts saying the correct postage had been paid. The business kept over $418,000 of customers' postage money, booking it as 'presort income.' The mail arrived promptly and customers testified they were satisfied with the service. The pair were charged with fifteen counts of defrauding their customers. The defence argued the customers received exactly the service they paid for and were not the targets of any fraud.