A Florida man could face years behind bars, accused of tossing a mail-in ballot and other election-related mail into the woods while serving as a contract U.S. postal worker.
Federal authorities on Friday arrested Ottis McCoy, charging him with discarding over 1,000 pieces of mail instead of delivering them while working his Orlando delivery route on Tuesday. He was charged with stealing, taking or abstracting mail, a criminal offense punishable by a fine of up to $250,000 and a prison term of up to five years.
According to an affidavit alongside a criminal complaint filed with the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida on Friday, Charles Johnsten, inspector with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service (USPIS), recalled observing a surveillance video of McCoy “throwing large quantities of U.S. Mail into [a] wooded lot.”
Authorities were alerted due to another postal worker becoming suspicious when he helped McCoy load up a van with a large quantity of mail before seeing him return from his route earlier than expected. A tracking device installed on the van later confirmed that McCoy deviated from the route.
The discarded mail was later discovered in a wooded area of an Orlando neighborhood that was near McCoy’s route. Footage of McCoy tossing the mail away was also captured by a camera installed on a cul-de-sac home adjacent to the woods, authorities said.
“Inspectors collected the U.S. Mail and discovered more than 1000 pieces of U.S. Mail, including more than 400 pieces of political mail and one election ballot,” Johnsten wrote in the affidavit, which included images of the ballot and other pieces of mail scattered on the ground.
At the time of publication, it was unclear whether McCoy had obtained legal representation.
Newsweek reached out for comment to the USPIS via email on Friday night.
Earlier this year, a Tennessee postal worker was accused of throwing bins of mail into a dumpster instead of delivering it after a TikTok video went viral. Federal officials this month charged the worker, DuJuan Butler, with unlawfully detaining and delaying mail.
While no evidence has been presented to suggest that either incident was politically motivated, concerns about the security of election mail have recently been heightened due to the coming presidential election.
Former President Donald Trump falsely claimed during the 2020 election that voting by mail is rife with fraud, although he has encouraged his supporters to vote early by any method during the current election.
The FBI is investigating the source of a fake video shared to social media this week alongside claims that it showed a person tearing up mail-in votes for Trump in Pennsylvania. Local bipartisan election officials quickly denounced the hoaxed video.
In a joint statement with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the FBI said on Friday that the investigation had found “that Russian actors manufactured and amplified” the video.
“In the lead up to election day and in the weeks and months after, [we expect] Russia to create and release additional media content that seeks to undermine trust in the integrity of the election and divide Americans,” the statement adds.
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