A Indianapolis delivery worker was shot and killed on Monday after a man was reportedly upset about a stimulus cheque.
In a statement released by the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, officials say responders found 45-year-old Angela Summers, a U.S. Postal Service (USPS) employee, suffering from gunshot wounds just after 4 p.m. on Monday.
Summers was taken to the hospital, but died later that day.
According to the local branch of the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC), per Fox 59, Summers expressed concerns about people living at the home of the man arrested.
The union believes the person inside the home wasn’t receiving a stimulus cheque in her deliveries, said Paul Toms, president of NALC Branch 39.
“The mail had been curtailed from what I was told very recently,” Toms told the broadcast station. “On April 12 or 13, the curtailment of mail letter was sent to them.”
Summers also alleged that she delivered several dog notes, which asked the homeowners to keep their small dog away from her while she delivered mail.
“There was a history on this for quite a while, as I understand it. Dog letters had been sent. That’s a form to the patron when a dog is a nuisance or a danger or vicious,” Toms explained to Fox 59.
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“Three dog letters, one to warn them, a second one (as) a second warning, and then a curtailment of mail. That’s what they had proceeded to there.”
According to an affidavit sworn by a U.S. postal inspector and filed in federal court, an altercation on a neighbour’s porch occurred after Summers bypassed the man’s home.
The affidavit says that when the man approached her, she sprayed him with mace, at which point he allegedly pulled a gun from his waistband and fired one shot. According to a statement provided to police and cited in the affidavit, the man claimed the spray bothered him because of his asthma.
The affidavit says the man had never spoken to Summers and only wanted to scare her, not kill her.
Tony Cushingberry-Mays, 21, was arrested on Monday. He has been charged with murder, assault, and discharging a firearm during the commission of an offence, according to documents filed in the U.S. federal court for the South District of Indiana.
A GoFundMe has been set up to help Summers’ family pay for her funeral expenses. It’s so far collected more than US$15,000 of the $16,500 goal.
On Tuesday, USPS offered a US$50,000 reward for information about Summers’s death.
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