LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Residents in the Mountain's Edge community are used to missing letters and torn envelopes.
For years, neighbors say their mail has gotten mixed up, messed with, or gone missing altogether and they want to know who's to blame.
As far back as 2015, Rikki Martin can remember somebody messing with her mail.
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"When my mother would send me cards with money or gift cards in them, they would arrive in the mail and they would either be open and things would be missing," she says, "Or they would just be opened and tampered with and nothing would be missing."
Two months ago, she was checking her mail when she saw a stack of letters left on the floor and one of the mailboxes left unlocked and wide open.
She blames the contracted carrier working on behalf of the post office.
"I think the person delivering the mail is the only one who had access to the keys for the mail. So, I believe that they are the culprits," says Martin.
Martin is not the only one in Mountain's Edge whose mail has gone missing. Sarkis Shiklanian got email confirmation last month that his mother-in-law had sent him and his wife an anniversary card, but it never came.
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"Well it feels like you’ve been robbed, right? Like anything, if you know you’re getting something like a package and it just disappears, it’s the same thing as somebody just robbing you," says Shiklanian.
In both cases, Shiklanian and Martin say they filed a complaint with the post office, but never heard back.
"No, I’ve received zero response from them and I spoke to them on the telephone on a number of occasions and they didn’t seem very concerned," says Martin.
"They have never given us a proper response of what happened or where it went or who took it," says Shiklanian.
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13 Action News reached out to the USPS and they sent us a statement confirming the complaints.
It reads, in part,:
The postal inspectors in Las Vegas are aware of mail theft occurring in the Mountain’s Edge community and investigating the matter. At this time, we do not believe any USPS employees are involved in stealing mail. Unfortunately, the area appears to be targeted by mail thieves; The specifics as to “how” I cannot comment on as we don’t comment on active investigations.
Neighbors like Martin say they're not buying it.
"This is going on since we’ve lived here for four years and nothing has changed. So, they can say that they opened up an investigation, but I’m not inclined to have too much faith in that," says Martin.
To keep your mail safe, the USPS urges you to promptly remove your mail after it's delivered, lock your mailbox afterwards, and if you have to mail money, send it as a secure check.
Plus, the post office has tools to track your shipment, including the Informed Delivery Digest, which will tell you what letters or packages are on the way before they arrive.
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The USPS wants to stress that mail theft is a federal felony and they take it very seriously.
If you think your mail has been stolen or tampered with, you can report it by clicking this link.
