Three men involved in a conspiracy to steal checks from the mail and use them with fraudulently opened bank accounts were sentenced Thursday to federal prison.
U.S. District Judge Joshua M. Divine sentenced Isaiah W. Douglas, 25, of Champaign, Illinois, to 39 months in prison; Luis A. Franco-Gonzalez, 26, of Rantoul, Illinois, to 34 months; and Isaiah B. Handford, 28, to 33 months.
Douglas and others stole checks, or arranged for checks to be stolen, from U.S. Postal Service collection boxes in and around St. Louis. Handford and Franco-Gonzalez then posed as representatives of businesses whose checks had been stolen. Using fraudulent documents supplied by Douglas, they opened or attempted to open bank accounts in the businesses’ names…