Vancouver man accused of stealing $73,000 worth of collectible stamps from Hazel Dell-area store

A Vancouver man is accused of stealing more than $70,000 worth of collectible stamps from a Hazel Dell-area store and trying to sell them to another stamp store.

Oleg Y. Zalevskiy, 38, appeared Friday in Clark County Superior Court on suspicion of first-degree theft. A judge set his bail at $10,000, and he is scheduled to be arraigned Sept. 4, court records show.

On June 24, an employee of Brookman Stamp Co. reported to Vancouver police an unknown man entered the store, 6300 N.E. St. James Road, Suite 103B, browsed and then left with a large container of collectible stamps without paying. The store’s owner gave police a list of the stamps that were in the box, which totaled $73,345, according to a probable cause affidavit.

The owner showed law enforcement surveillance video of the man and circulated the video to other area stamp stores, court records state.

The owner of another store, Uptown Stamps in Portland, reported to police he’d received a phone call from a man about selling stamps, and the man later brought the collectibles into the store. The owner said he recognized the stamps’ packaging, as well as handwriting on it, through doing business with the Hazel Dell store, according to the affidavit.

Video footage from the Portland store showed the man’s appearance and clothing matched the man seen taking the box from the Hazel Dell store, court records state.

Police were able to match the phone number to Zalevskiy. Officers also had previous contact with Zalevskiy as a suspect in other theft reports and knew him to match the description from the stamp store, the affidavit states.