Thieving postman faces music in Germany

A German postman sold parcels on an Internet auctions site instead of delivering them.

When police searched the 37-year-old’s flat they turned up a hoard of missing deliveries.

The man started siphoning off packages and offering their contents on on-line auction site eBay last summer, police said. In all, more than 100 went missing, and police estimated the total value at £13,000 (€19,400).

While the German post office noticed that packages frequently went missing on his round, it was unable to prove anything until a musician whose clarinet mouthpiece went missing in the mail blew the whistle.

After the package failed to arrive, he found an identical item on eBay - offered by the postman from the town of Gelsenkirchen. He bought it, but also informed police.

Police found the missing mouthpiece at the apartment of the postman’s girlfriend and then searched his own apartment – turning up piles of missing packages.

The man confessed to stealing the mail and was released after questioning, police said.