That’s a lot of postage.
A Marblehead postal worker made off with more than $18,000 through a couple schemes that boiled down to pocketing money people paid for stamps and money orders.
On Friday, U.S. District Court Judge Patti B. Saris sentenced Zeon Johnson, 28, of Saugus, to just time served — a day in jail — and two years of supervised release. It’s a sentence that finds a middle ground between the prosecution’s ask of 30 days in prison with three years of supervised release and the defense’s ask of time served with one year of supervised release, according to their respective sentencing memos.
He’ll also have to fork over the $18,206 he stole from the U.S. Postal Service.
While that sum is only a 74th of the $1,351,250 a single Inverted Jenny — often listed as the most valuable U.S. stamp in history — sold for at auction in 2016, it’s enough to have sent out 27,667 regular letters or 35,805 postcards to family and friends at current postage rates.
A Boston Police officer working a paid detail in Dorchester Center got pepper sprayed in the face while attempting to stop one of two fights in the middle of the road, the police department reported.
The officer was working a detail in the area of Washington Street and Talbot Avenue Friday morning when, at around 11:15 a.m., two women began fighting in the middle of the road, according to a Boston Police Department statement. The officer tried to separate the two women when another fight broke out, causing a distraction that one of the two fighting women allegedly used to pepper spray the officer in the face. The sprayer then tried to make her getaway in a car.
By this time, other police arrived as backup and were able to stop the car and put the suspect into handcuffs, but the BPD reports that it wasn’t easy — she resisted and another person in the car also interfered on her behalf. They told the second woman to stop interfering or she would be arrested but, alas, she began “to assault multiple officers, and a struggle ensued,” according to the police statement.
Eventually, both women were placed under arrest and are due for arraignment in municipal court in Dorchester.
Skyla Malave, 18, of Dorchester, was charged with assault and battery on a police officer, assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and resisting arrest. Priscilla Malave, 40, of Dorchester, was charged with assault and battery on a police officer and resisting arrest.
Boston Police rounded up four city residents they said were trying to steal cars whose owners had left running to warm them up in the early morning cold Saturday.
Jay Moses, 27, of Dorchester; Diamond Carter, 27, of Boston; Justin Creech, 24, of West Roxbury; and Thomas Perkins, 24, of Hyde Park, were all arrested after police showed up to the 1400 block of River Street a little after 5 a.m. They were each charged with breaking and entering of a motor vehicle and attempted larceny of a motor vehicle and are expected to be arraigned in municipal court in West Roxbury.