Letter carriers raise alarm over assaults, call for protections

Letter carriers rallied Sunday outside the downtown Minneapolis Post Office to raise awareness and call for on-the-job safety for their ranks.

Once rare, violent attacks on letter carriers have spiked in recent years with more than 2,000 nationally since 2020, said leaders of the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC). Letter carriers in Detroit, Phoenix, Cincinnati and other cities have rallied with a similar message in recent months, according to media reports.

"Since the Postal Service was founded nearly 250 years ago, letter carriers in uniform have been able to walk down the meanest streets of this country without incident," NALC President Brian Renfroe told more than 60 people who had turned out in below-freezing weather. "Nobody messed with us, remember that? That's no longer the case."

In November, carriers in Edina and Brooklyn Center were robbed at gunpoint less than 24 hours apart, said Joseph Tiemann, NALC Branch 9 executive vice president.

"Fortunately, in these two cases, nobody was physically harmed, but the trauma lives," Tiemann said, adding that he learned Friday that a suspect had been caught in the cases. "This is something that a letter carrier should never have to experience."

Patrick Johnson, NALC regional national business agent, said there were more than 30 assaults on letter carriers in 2022 and 2023 in Region 7, which comprises Minnesota, Wisconsin and the Dakotas. Among them was the shooting death of Milwaukee letter carrier Aundre Cross in the December 2022.

Nationally, Johnson said, only 14% of assaults on letter carriers resulted in prosecution.

Assaults are increasing as fraudsters have developed schemes that make accessing mail profitable, Renfroe said.

One such scheme is check washing, which involves stealing checks from the mail, changing such information as payee name and dollar amounts, and then depositing or duplicating them, Renfroe said.

"Gaining access to the mail is not the reason for 100 percent of these crimes, but the vast majority — either to steal the mail directly or to gain access to our keys that we use to access mailboxes," he said.

Speakers at the rally called on the U.S. Postal Service to better protect workers and the U.S. Justice Department to deter attacks by strongly prosecuting anyone accused of assaulting letter carriers.

In May 2023, the Postal Service and Postal Inspection Service launched Project Safe Delivery, an effort to reduce postal crimes with such measures as enforcement surges, installation of more secure mail collection boxes and replacement of old locks with electronic ones as carriers were targeted for their keys.

NALC leaders also asked community members to keep an eye out for carriers, just as carriers often serve as the eyes and ears of the neighborhoods they work in.

"If you see your letter carrier walking down the street, watching them walk to the end of the block could literally be the difference between this happening or this not happening. Just keep your eyes open," Renfroe said.

Daniel Brito, who delivers mail south of downtown Minneapolis, came to the rally with a homemade sign that read, "My safety is flat rate priority." He said his father also is a letter carrier and the prospect of either of them being assaulted is terrifying.

Manon Wojack has been a letter carrier in north Minneapolis' Lowry station for nearly 24 years. She said that in many cases, such as the unrest after the murder of George Floyd in 2020, postal workers have brought hope to communities.

"We stood together," she said. "Now we have to have hope that we make it home safe at night."