BIRMINGHAM — A federal grand jury today indicted a former U.S. Postal Service clerk in Tuscaloosa on charges including stealing prescription painkillers from the mail, announced U.S. Attorney Joyce White Vance, Postal Service Office of Inspector General Special Agent in Charge Max Eamiguel, of the Southern Area Field Office, and Postal Inspection Service Team Leader Frank Dyer.

An indictment filed in U.S. District Court charges that NICHOLAS STEVEN DAVIS, 42, of Tuscaloosa, stole a medical parcel containing about 180 tablets of hydrocodone from the mail on July 6, 2012, while he worked as a distribution clerk at the Skyland Post Office. The parcel was addressed to someone on Lake Lurleen in Coker, Ala. The indictment also charges Davis with delaying or detaining packages intended for delivery by mail on July 6, 2012.

The two other counts of the indictment charge that, after Davis was fired from the Postal Service, he broke into the Skyland Post Office on June 7, 2014, and June 15, 2014, intending to commit theft.

The maximum penalty for each of the charges is five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

The Postal Service OIG and the Postal Inspection Service investigated the case, which Assistant U.S. Attorney Frank Salter is prosecuting.

The public is reminded that an indictment contains only charges. A defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

US Attorney’s Office, Northern District Alabama