Man Sentenced to 30 Years in Prison for Murdering Letter Carrier

A letter carrier named Angela Summers was delivering mail on her usual route when she walked past a house where the Postal Service had recently stopped delivering because of concerns about a dog on the property.

Upset that the mail had been stopped, a resident of that house, Tony Cushingberry, pursued Ms. Summers and fatally shot her on his street in Indianapolis on April 27, 2020, federal prosecutors said.

On Wednesday, Mr. Cushingberry, 24, was sentenced to 30 years in prison for murdering Ms. Summers, 45.

Paul Toms, president of Branch 39 of the National Association of Letter Carriers in Indianapolis, said in an interview on Thursday that the sentence was justified.

“She couldn’t deliver the mail because of the dog and that irritated this young man and he did the unthinkable,” Mr. Toms said.

He noted that Ms. Summers, a union steward who had joined the Postal Service about 15 months before she was killed, had a teenage daughter and had not yet qualified for the union’s life insurance plan.

“The court case has come to a close, but it’s never going to be closed — not for her family or letter carriers,” Mr. Toms said. “She was part of our family.”

According to a criminal complaint, the local post office had sent a letter to Mr. Cushingberry’s house two weeks before the shooting saying that the mail would have to be picked up at the post office because of concerns about a dog on the property. Such letters are not unusual, according to Mr. Toms.

On the day she was killed, Ms. Summer was delivering mail on Mr. Cushingberry’s street when she walked past his house as he watched her from his porch, prosecutors said.

Mr. Cushingberry “aggressively approached” Ms. Summers on a neighbor’s porch and demanded his mail several times, prosecutors said.

He continued to pursue Ms. Summers, who eventually reached for her can of Mace and sprayed Mr. Cushingberry, according to court documents.

Mr. Cushingberry pulled a handgun from his waistband and shot Ms. Summers in the chest from several feet away, the documents state. She collapsed on a neighbor’s porch and was taken to a hospital in critical condition. She died that evening.

Mr. Cushingberry fled after the shooting and stashed the gun in the garage of a nearby home, prosecutors said.

United States Postal Service inspectors and Indianapolis police officers searched Mr. Cushingberry’s house and found a safe that contained boxes of ammunition, including the caliber and brand of fired cartridge casing that matched the gun he used, prosecutors said.

After the shooting, Mr. Cushingberry told investigators that he had never spoken to Ms. Summers before and had only “wanted to scare her,” according to court documents.

Mr. Cushingberry pleaded guilty last July to second-degree murder.

Sara Varner, his lead lawyer, said in a statement that the court, in handing down a sentence of 30 years, did not give sufficient weight to Mr. Cushingberry’s “history of trauma and poverty and resulting post-traumatic stress disorder, his underdeveloped brain at the time of the shooting, his youth, the fact that he had absolutely no criminal history,” and comparable cases of second-degree murder.

“Murder is always serious,” Ms. Varner said, “but this sentence does not represent justice.”

Mr. Cushingberry was the first person in his family to graduate from high school and a “doting father to his infant son,” Ms. Varner said.

“His remorse and deep regret for what he did was reflected in his guilty plea and statement to the court at sentencing,” she said.

After Ms. Summers was killed, local postal workers organized a memorial ride that drew hundreds of motorcyclists and raised $72,000 for her daughter, Mr. Toms said. Postal workers at the union’s national convention raised another $27,000, he said.

Zachary A. Myers, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Indiana, said in a statement that Ms. Summers was “a beloved family member and public servant, and she should be alive today.”

“No term of imprisonment will bring Angela back,” he said, “but the sentence imposed today demonstrates that those who kill will face judgment and accountability.”