Illinois Senator Dick Durbin announces plan to protect postal workers

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Illinois Senator Dick Durbin announced Friday a new plan from the U.S. Postmaster General to help keep postal workers safe while working their routes.

The plan is called Project Safe Delivery Initiative, and as part of it 49,000 master keys and locks across the nation will be replaced.

The keys appear to have been the main target of thieves who rob postal workers.

"With these master keys thieves can steal mail anytime they want to, allowing them to wash and rewrite checks for the amount they want or even resell keys to criminals," Durbin said.

Just this week, Chicago police arrested a man who now faces federal charges for allegedly stealing mail out of a mailbox in the West Loop. Investigators said Richard Thompson used an arrow key to open the mailbox.

The Postal Service Branch 11 union said more than 80 of its workers have been robbed since the beginning of 2023. Arrow keys were taken in some of those cases. Sen. Durbin said there's no timeline on how long the replacement process will take, but the unions are hoping it will be soon because safety is top of mind for mail carriers across the city.

"Some of those carriers have not returned to the street because they're traumatized," said Elise Foster, USPS union president. "It is a traumatizing experience."

While there's no telling how long the process will take to upgrade the equipment, there is a strong urge from union presidents as well as Sen. Durbin to make sure local and federal prosecutors convict these criminals so there's a precedent for these crimes.