A U.S. Postal Service employee who worked in the Corona, Queens facility was arrested for stealing department store coupons and selling them online. According to the Post, "Thomas Tang, 38, of Baldwin, Long Island, allegedly pilfered more than 7,000 coupons from JCPenney, Kohl's and Lowe's and sold them in batches on" eBay—he estimated he made about $35,000 between October 2009 and this month just on the JC Penney coupons. And what drove him to this desperate act?
Tang told investigators, "I have two small children, and my wife is pregnant. I also have a mortgage, and I have to pay cash for my chil dren's baby sitter. I did not want this to happen, but it was the only way I could avoid having my house foreclosed on."
The Nassau County Police, which were approached by JC Penney's loss prevention division and postal inspectors, explained the scheme, "He was taking these coupons out of the mail and selling them on eBay in packets of, maybe, 10 for a substantial discount. People would bid on them and they weren't close to the actual price that J.C. Penney's would lose on each coupon ... If he was stealing these, then any amount of money he was selling them for was a profit for him."
Tang pleaded not guilty to second-degree grand larceny and is being held on $10,000 bail; his lawyer told the Post, "I'm not going to minimize it... but it's certainly not your typical crime."
