PORTSMOUTH, Va. — A former U.S. Postal Service employee has pleaded guilty to federal charges after admitting he dumped thousands of pieces of mail in Portsmouth because he felt overwhelmed by his route, according to court documents.
Kristian Peele, 21, who was hired as a city carrier assistant in 2024, is scheduled to be sentenced Friday for one count of the delay or destruction of mail.
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Federal prosecutors said between Feb. 28 and March 1, approximately 4,900 pieces of mail were discovered discarded in a dead-end area on the 2300 block of South Street. About half of the mail had been destroyed by water, according to the documents.
The abandoned items included certified mail, tax documents, checks from the U.S. Treasury, immigration papers, and information from the IRS.
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When interviewed by investigators, Peele said his mail route was "new" and "way longer" than he could handle, stating he "never gets to finish it." He admitted he did not inform his managers that the route was too long for him.
"Obviously, you'd want to trust the postal service," said legal analyst Sonny Stallings. "I wonder what his training was. I wonder what he'd been trained to do if he felt he couldn't keep up."
Investigators used tracking data and software to link Peele to the crime, according to the record.
