by Richard W. Millar, Jr.

When I was growing up, the mail was something special. As I have previously mentioned, we received two deliveries a day and I was often on alert for the postman as I frequently sent away for stuff.

For those of you who are too young to remember the days of radio serials, there were always promotions usually in conjunction with the other kind of cereals. For a quarter and a box top from, say, Wheaties, you could send in for the latest gadget used by one of your radio heroes. It would take forever to arrive, and there was no such thing as tracking numbers, so you had to keep a keen eye out for the postman.

I no longer remember everything I ordered, but there were a number of rings and, as I recall, a Captain Midnight Decoder Whistle which I used to decode messages for a week or two before the effort no longer matched the outcome and it was discarded. The various rings were all adjustable to fit young fingers, and I remember one was shaped like a bomb with glass at one end by the fins through which you could view the innards.

The rings were characteristically “gold,” at least in color, but after just a few days they would tarnish and both they and my fingers would turn an unattractive bluish green.

My mother grew tired of my preoccupation with such mail-order toys as our pantry shelves would be lined with topless cereal boxes standing like a parade of headless soldiers. No one, least of all me, ever wanted to eat any of the cereals.

The public’s fascination with mail continued as mail migrated to the internet as exemplified by the movie whose title I filched for this column. But whether paper or electronic, mail can be burdensome, particularly in an election year.

However, since my columns are (perhaps) an educational service, I write this one to warn you, if you receive mail from an inactive lawyer in Ohio named Richard John Steinle, don’t open it.

Mr. Steinle was an active customer of the United States Postal Service and one whose mailing volumes seem only slightly less than Amazon.

On July 6, 2022, he sent letters to members of the Ohio Senate.

Within a month thereafter, he sent over three dozen letters and parcels to elected officials in Ohio, Kentucky, California, and Washington, D.C.

His letters were sent to every Republican State Senator in Ohio, to Congressman Jim Jordan, and to federal judges in Ohio and California.

He was angry.

He wasn’t forthcoming on authorship, however, as he used the return address of an Ohio State Appeals Court with the initials of an employee who worked there who later told investigators that Mr. Steinle had been fired as a court mediator and may have blamed her for that.

He was charged first with a local misdemeanor and subsequently with a seven count federal complaint of mailing non-mailable Injurious Articles, to wit, as we lawyers say, “human feces.”

That’s right. When he wrote that each of his recipients should “EAT SH-T,” he thoughtfully included the proposed meal.

The record is silent as to the “supplier” of the feces, but no co-conspirator was named so, presumably it was self-manufactured, so to speak. Given the volume, that raises questions that I don’t even want to think about, much less know. Nor would I want to serve a search warrant on his mail room.

He pled guilty and was sentenced to two years’ probation on each count to be served concurrently and to complete a mental health evaluation and possible program. (I didn’t know there might be programs for people who send poop through the mail, but I digress.)

After his sentencing, the Ohio Disciplinary Counsel recently filed a complaint before the Board of Professional Conduct of the Supreme Court of Ohio praying that Mr. Steinle be found in violation of the Ohio Rules of Professional Conduct and “sanctioned accordingly.”

I don’t know if the Bar has the power to keep him away from all post offices, but if it can’t, and you receive a package from him, write on it:
“Return to sender.”

Richard W. Millar, Jr. is tired and retired. He can be reached at dickmillar9@gmail.com.