Postman admits setting fire to undelivered mail

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A postman who made a three-foot bonfire out of thousands of undelivered letters and packets has been given a suspended prison term.

Dean Bestwick, 23, from Cedar Avenue, Alfreton in Derbyshire pleaded guilty to arson at Derby Crown Court.

The court heard Bestwick, who was suffering from depression, also admitted failing to deliver an additional 4,012 items.

He set the items on fire in the garden of a house in Heanor, Derbyshire.

He was ordered to do 150 hours unpaid work, pay £1,800 costs and received a suspended four-month jail term.

Bestwick had worked for Royal Mail for three years in Alfreton.

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Postman burnt mail when 'job became too much'

A POSTMAN made a bonfire out of mail because he couldn't cope with his delivery workload, a court heard.

The remnants were discovered after a Severn Trent Water worker spotted red Royal Mail delivery bags in a nearby garden while he was digging a hole in Abbot Street, Heanor.

Investigators recovered postcodes from the heap and traced them back to the round of Alfreton postman Dean Bestwick, who had been in the job for three years.

The Heanor home had been rented by his girlfriend and a search was made of other houses used by Bestwick, now of Cedar Avenue, Alfreton.

Officers found undelivered mail indoors and in wheelie bins, said Martin Smith, prosecuting for the Royal Mail.

While most were "door to door" advertising letters, 77 were addressed to individuals.

Bestwick, 23, was questioned and said he could not cope with the work. He was later suspended.

Mr Smith told Derby Crown Court: "The defendant panicked and thought the way to get away with it without suspicion arising from the postal bags was to burn them.

"He should have returned the items. He said they accumulated and he forgot them until his girlfriend's move.

"He put bricks round them to form a chimney and poured petrol on the bags to make them burn. The pile was three feet high. The fire lasted for four hours.

"The defendant said the job had become too much and he was not capable of doing it in the time allowed."

Bestwick was ordered to do 150 hours' unpaid work and must pay £1,800 towards costs. He was also given a four-month prison sentence, suspended for a year.

Recorder Martin Jackson told him: "Over the course of something like 19 months, you delayed transmission of not just door-to-door deliveries – the post many of us refer to as junk mail – which businesses pay to be delivered.

"There were also deliveries to individuals.

"The public needs confidence their postman will deliver their post without a problem. You failed in that trust placed in you."

Bestwick had no previous convictions.

Quentin Robbins, in mitigation, said Bestwick was suffering from depression at the time of the offences. He now hoped to start work as a painter and decorator.

"He co-operated fully at the time of his arrest. He tried to hide nothing, led them to the addresses and agreed to searches," added Mr Robbins.

Bestwick admitted delaying 4,012 postal packets between June 2012 and March this year. He also pleaded guilty to destroying by fire an unknown quantity of postal packets between February and March.