TARRANT, Ala. (WIAT) — The Tarrant Police Department is alerting residents about a string of mail thefts in the area.

Tarrant police Chief Wendell Major says they have received three reports of theft and mail tampering in the past three months, two from the city’s post office.

“We had reports of people of checks that they had mailed had been smitten to their banks different than when they submitted them and they had mailed those checks and we noticed that after having three of those that there is a problem,” Major said.

One of the post office’s drop boxes was also damaged at the city’s post office.

Chief Major says it’s hard to find who did these crimes because there are no cameras at the post office or in the area.

TPD released a Facebook post this week recommending that residents consider taking any form of check, money orders and monetary funds that they’re mailing into the post office instead of dropping them in one of the boxes outside.

“Hopefully this will alert them that they should pay attention of who they see out and about near postal boxes,” Major said. “So we just need to be mindful and give [post service workers] some help and put some eyes on those boxes if we saw somebody damaging them.”

Julie Nicholson-Morgan, a spokesperson for the US Postal Inspector, released a statement saying in part quote:

“The U.S. Postal Inspection Service (USPS) is aware of the tampering of USPS collection boxes at the Tarrant post office. Postal inspectors rely on the reports by customers to identify any items taken from the mail……every mailbox, from an apartment panel to a blue USPS collection box, has strong security measures in place to protect the contents. However, thieves will use a variety of methods and tools to attempt to bypass these security measures. Mail theft most often occurs in the over-night hours when there are fewer people around to witness it.”

Chief Major also says to be on the lookout for any unusual activity if you’re sending or receiving a check through the mail.

“Generally, most personal checks have a phone number,” Major said.  “Reaching out to that person and saying hey we’ve received this check for your bill you know anything about that if they’re alarmed by it, you probably don’t want to deposit it.”

Chief Major says they’re currently working with the city to install cameras in certain areas in Tarrant.