SALT LAKE CITY — A man faces sentencing after pleading guilty to defrauding the government of nearly $200,000 in a postage stamp scam.
Ivan Sanchez, 36, has been held without bail in the Davis County Jail since Feb. 21 on one count of felony theft of government property.
A federal grand jury in Salt Lake City indicted Sanchez Dec. 19 for what Assistant U.S. Attorney Lake Dishman described as an “elaborate ruse over the past 10 years.”
The indictment said Sanchez would have fraudulent checks printed with a legitimate local address and then write checks at nearby post offices for numerous 100-stamp rolls.
“Because he has a local address, the post office will accept what it thinks is a valid, in-state check,” Dishman wrote in an April 7 court document. “After a few days, he leaves the state with thousands of dollars worth of postal stamps. He then fences the postal stamps and repeats the cycle by targeting the post offices in a different location.”