Federal Judge Humilates Mail Thief

[TxDoc]

Judge gives new meaning to the phrase 'scarlet letter'

 

Bay City News   Tuesday, February 25, 2003  

 

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Steal mail and you may go to jail-- but a 24-year-old man convicted of mail theft will not only do time, he will also have to spend 100 hours in front of a post office wearing a sandwich board reading "I have stolen mail. This is my punishment."

 

U.S. District Judge Vaughn R. Walker doled out the unusual punishment in federal court in San Francisco today to Shawn Gementera, 24, of San Francisco.

 

Gementera will also have to serve two months in prison as well as three years of supervised release.

 

Gementera was indicted by a federal grand jury on Nov. 27, 2001. As part of a plea agreement, he admitted to stealing mail between May 18 and 21 of 2001, from residences in San Francisco and Burlingame. Forty-two pieces of mail, including a U.S. Treasury check for $1,525, were found on Gementera's person when he was arrested.

 

Judge Walker said the sentence dispensed today was meant to emphasize the seriousness of mail theft offenses, and deter others from repeating Gementera's crime.