Mail carrier steals golf survey from mail, gets job at course
By: Freeman Klopott
Examiner Staff Writer
August 27, 2009
Golf has been both William Seville's downfall and his savior.
In March, the Ashburn-based mail carrier stole an erroneously addressed golf survey, filled it out and mailed it in, delivering evidence of his crime into the hands of the inspector general agent who created the survey.
He has since pleaded guilty to embezzling five inspector-general created parcels -- including the golf survey -- and resigned from his U.S. Postal Service job as part of his plea agreement.
Now, Seville works for Trump National Golf Club in Potomac Falls, "performing a variety of functions in the day-to-day operations of the golf course," his attorney wrote in court documents filed in Alexandria's federal court.
"Mr. Seville enjoys his work and is a valued employee; this is evidenced by his being kept on as an employee even after disclosing his conviction," the attorney wrote.
The golf survey was the only one of the five inspector general "test letters" that Seville opened, he admitted. Seville filled the survey out, including personal information in the form before dropping it into the mail stream.
Each of the so-called "test letters" listed a fake address that would have been on Seville's route, court documents said. Since the address was wrong, Seville should have returned the letters to the post office where they could be sent back to the sender via the correct return address.
"We send test letters when there is a suspicion of problems on a specific route," said Postal Service spokesman Wally Olihovik. "If you have a mail carrier with a number of missing items reported by customers, then we take a much closer look and do targeting with test letters."
The fake golf survey likely offered something of value "like a dozen golf balls," Olihovik said. "If he filled out I assume there was some reason, something in it for him to do that."
Seville, who court documents show has had trouble with drinking and gambling, is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 4. Prosecutors are requesting that he receive probation and not jail time.
A call Wednesday to Trump National was not immediately returned.
