By PAUL HAMMEL
Nebraska Examiner
LINCOLN — Duct tape giveth and duct tape taketh away.
That appears to be the moral of the story of an Omaha man who used the sticky tape to steal letters dropped in a mailbox.
But duct tape had its revenge because it also preserved the fingerprints of the mail bandit, helping lead to the arrest of Jorge Felix Morejon, 25, of Omaha.
Morejon was sentenced Monday to five months in prison for mail theft by U.S. District Judge Robert Rossiter.
In July, postal inspectors found duct tape rings that were placed inside the snorkel of a mail collection box in Omaha. The duct tape was used to capture mail deposited in the box.
Surveillance cameras later showed Morejon using gift cards that had been placed in envelopes in the duct tape traps by investigators. Eight of his fingerprints were also found on the duct tape.
A press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office said Morejon had been convicted in Miami of a similar mail theft scheme using duct tape in 2017.
Such thefts are not unheard of. In 2018, the Palm Beach Post reported that thieves had stolen more than $400,000 from blue collection boxes using duct tape and shoestrings over three years.
After being released from prison, Morejon will serve three years of supervised release. He was also ordered to pay $25 in restitution.