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In the latest incident, longtime city letter carrier Octavia
Redmond was gunned down July 19 in the West Pullman neighborhood
by a man wearing a ski mask as she went door to door.
Authorities said the assailant fired at least eight shots at
Redmond before fleeing in a waiting vehicle.
“Like me, the members of [National Association of Letter
Carriers] are outraged by this senseless act of violence that
took an innocent woman’s life,” NALC President Brian Renfroe
said in a statement. “For far too long, violent crime against
letter carriers has been on the rise. Shockingly, now it is not
uncommon for letter carriers to be targeted, assaulted, and even
murdered. This is completely unacceptable, and we need immediate
change.”
Ford said he’s in talks with members of Congress on how to
address the trend.
“Every postal worker is traumatized by their work conditions and
feeling unsafe and that's not right,” Ford told The Center
Square. “We need to figure out if we need to collaborate with
postal police or the state and federal government figuring out
exactly what we need to do to provide protection for them.”
Whatever the course of action comes to be, NALC Branch 11
President Elise Foster argues a plan for change can’t come soon
enough.
“I don’t know what that might look like, someone following the
letter carriers on their routes like the Guardian Angels did
before or what, but something has to happen,” she said.
In the days after Redmond’s murder, postal workers and union
leaders gathered at a South Side union hall to demand lawmakers
take action, with one speaker after the other telling the crowd
the time for just more talk coming from lawmakers has long
passed.
Ford is in full agreement.
“It's not always adding different penalties to perpetrators.
It's also important to put penalties out there that should act
as a deterrent, and that's what we want,” Ford said.
“Politicians have a certain law that protects them against,
violence. That legislatively could be the change that is needed,
that any type of violence against a postal worker could
automatically be some type of felony.”
As it is, Ford argues postal workers have become unfair targets
in the minds of far too many criminals intent on cashing in.
“They have checks in their possession, hundreds of thousands of
dollars sometimes, packages in their possession and we have to
protect them,” he said. “Postal workers are targets and they're
under attack. Why would they want to go out and continue to do
their job?”
Renfroe said Congress must act.
“Earlier this year, bipartisan lawmakers introduced the Protect
Our Letter Carriers Act in both chambers of Congress,” Renfroe
said. “This comprehensive solution would deter these crimes from
happening and hold those who commit these horrific acts
accountable. In honor of Sister Redmond, we urge Congress to
swiftly pass this bill. The nation’s letter carriers cannot wait
any longer.”
The U.S. Postal Inspection Service is now offering a reward of
up to $250,000 for information that leads to an arrest and
conviction in Redmond’s case, while her family has launched a
GoFundMe to help cover costs.
Greg Bishop contributed to this report.
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