NEWARK, N.J. — Federal officials said a mail carrier with the United States Postal Service collected more than $156,000 in disability payments but was caught running a travel agency.

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The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey said Pamela VanSyckle, 60, pleaded guilty in federal court to information charging her with a count of federal employee compensation fraud.

VanSuckle filed a claim form in September 2020 that she was injured while working. She signed the form and other multiple federal claim forms in which she had claimed that she had not worked or had another job at the time. She then was able to collect $156,872 in disability payments, prosecutors said.

Court records indicated that her travel agency website showed that she specialized in “all aspects of Disney travel,” according to the Miami Herald.

It was later learned that VanSyckle was receiving the payments while running her own travel agency. Court records and prosecutors said, according to the newspaper, that VanSyckle was visiting Walt Disney World and Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida, from Morris County, New Jersey.

The fraud charge carries a possible maximum sentence of five years in prison with a maximum fine of $250,000 or “twice the gross amount of any pecuniary gain,” prosecutors said. She is expected to be sentenced on June 12.

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