I-TEAM: Have USPS security updates made it to the CSRA?

AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) - When you drop a letter or a bill in a blue collection box, you expect it will get where it needs to go.

Crooks have other plans, though, and the post office knows it.

That’s why two years ago, USPS said it was taking some key steps to keep your mail and its postal workers safe.

We’ve had robberies in our area recently, so your I-TEAM went looking for those security updates, but it wasn’t easy getting you those answers.

Surveillance video out of Memphis, Tennessee, shows a man appear to throw a mail carrier up against her truck. It’s difficult to see, but he has a gun.

You can hear him demand that she give him her keys.

In another doorbell camera video, an armed robber in Cincinnati, Ohio, also approaches a USPS employee.

You can clearly see him pointing a gun at her, telling her to hand over her keys. These types of crimes are happening in our area, too.

Deputies just made a second arrest in the armed robbery of a postal worker that happened on Jonathan Circle in Augusta back in November.

On Wednesday night, deputies arrested a 17-year-old. They had previously arrested a juvenile.

Seven months before that, an incident report shows another 17-year-old suspect pointed a knife at another mail carrier in Augusta and said, “Give me the keys – or I will kill you.”

“Keys” is a keyword – specifically, “arrow keys.”

Those are universal keys that open blue collection boxes and P.O. Boxes. They also open cluster boxes, like the ones found at apartment buildings.

“These keys are on the dark web for $5-6-7,000,” said Louis DeJoy.

The former US Postmaster General was testifying before Congress in 2023, the same year USPS rolled out Project Safe Delivery.

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Part of that plan included replacing arrow keys with digital locks that can’t be stolen. USPS also said it wanted to install “high security” blue collection boxes, making them tougher targets for crooks.

Fast-forward to 2025, and the I-TEAM has uncovered that these changes still haven’t happened everywhere, leaving mail carriers still at risk.

They’re not the only ones.

Meredith Anderson: “How did you know there was a problem?”

Debbie Smith: “Well, this is actually the second time this has happened.”

A couple of years ago, someone stole Smith’s check to the power company.

“We don’t ever send anything from our house because people do pick up stuff out of mailboxes,” said Smith.

Smith also avoids collection boxes in places like shopping centers because she says they feel less secure.

Whenever she mailed a check – and yes, she says people are still writing checks, she would take the extra time to physically drive it to the post office.

Meredith Anderson: “You would think the post office would be safe.” Debbie Smith: “That’s what I thought. I don’t think so anymore.”

On Dec.19, 2024, officers in North Augusta received a call about someone stealing mail from the blue collection box at the Post Office on Georgia Avenue.

Police found the car and tried to stop it, but the driver took off.

The chase crossed into Georgia, where the car crashed.

Two men got out and ran, but officers chased them down and arrested them.

Debbie learned about this when reporting that she had been the victim of check fraud because she slipped her checks into that very same box. “There’s no security cameras or anything, even at the post office, to protect that one,” said Smith. “So the one at the post office is no more secure than the one sitting in the shopping center parking lot.”

The I-Team looked, and from what we can tell, cameras have not been added since.

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What about Project Safe Delivery?

We asked the post office where the new, high-security collection boxes have been installed because it doesn’t appear to have happened at the North Augusta Post Office.

USPS will only say the new boxes and electronic keys are currently being deployed in “High security risk areas throughout the country,” including the Augusta-Aiken area.

However, USPS would not provide specific locations or photos. Your I-Team did eventually find photos of the new boxes online, but USPS recommends skipping the blue boxes altogether and taking your mail inside the post office.

That’s what Smith says she plans to do after her recent theft; thieves washed, or changed, her $500 check to Lowes to a $5,200 check to someone else.

The bank provided Smith with a photo of that check someone attempted to cash.

“Lowes” had been washed and replaced with “Tamika Johnson.”

Someone also wrote the reason for the check was “Christmas gifts.”

Meredith Anderson: “Do you know a Tamika Johnson?” Debbie Smith: “No. Not at all. And I surely wouldn’t have given her Christmas gifts worth $5,200 because I have two grandkids.”

Next to “Christmas gifts,” someone also drew a smiley face with the tongue sticking out.

“Which was even more infuriating,” said Smith.

On top of that, Smith ran into someone else who was also a victim of check fraud.

“Same week as me. And that one was a $9,000. They changed that one to a $9,000 check, and SRP caught that one for them,” said Debbie. The check was also changed to have it made out to “Tamika Johnson. “Yep. Same name. Same name,” said Smith.

On the US Postal inspection website, mail carrier thefts and wanted posters continue to pile up.

But as for those higher security blue boxes, we really don’t know where in our area they are.

We specifically told the post office we wanted to be able to tell our viewers where the safest blue boxes were, and they still refused to tell us.

So the takeaway here is if you have a check or something important, physically take it into the post office.

That’s what the post office told us, even with these new higher-security boxes.

Because at the end of the day, they make it more difficult for crooks to break in, but it’s still not impossible.

Also this week, a Washington County man was convicted of aggravated assault and other charges after making threats and racial slurs against a mail carrier and later hitting his vehicle with a tractor.

William Charles Franklin, 36, of Tennille, was found guilty on all counts charged against him in the federal indictment.

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