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Postal kiosks used to deliver illegal drugs bought online

April 17, 2017

Two men who pled guilty to selling illegal drugs on the Internet used self-serve postal kiosks to mail goods to customers, according to Arstechnica.com. Lawyers for one man entered a guilty plea to three counts of drug charges in US District Court Friday. A co-conspirator pled guilty in January.

According to an affidavit filed by a Drug Enforcement Administration special agent, the two men used monikers online to advertise they were importing heroin from Afghanistan.

Law enforcement was able to trace the men's public keys to their social media accounts. A Facebook profile for one of the men indicated he lived in Brooklyn, New York.

An undercover agent purchased heroin from one of the men. The agent sent the packages to a DEA lab that was able to lift fingerprints from the packages. The fingerprints matched those of Abdullah Almashwali, who was arrested in 2008 for receiving stolen property.

An inspector from the United States Postal Inspection Service determined that the postage on the packages was purchased from a self-service kiosk in Brooklyn, New York.

U.S. District Judge Dale Drozd is scheduled to sentence Almashwali on July 24. His co-conspirator, Chaudhry Ahmad Farooq, is scheduled for sentencing on May 15.