A letter carrier was charged with mail theft after about 13,500 pieces of undelivered mail were found in his basement.

Theodis Lofton, 39, could get up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Police who had gone to Lofton’s home in this St. Louis suburb to help with a foreclosure found 17 mail trays and four garbage bags filled with mail.

From March 1993 through February, he allegedly failed to deliver about 3,500 pieces of first-class mail and 10,000 pieces of third-class mail.