The U.S. Department of Transportation reported that a U.S. District Court in Chicago had sentenced Freedom Transportation, Inc. trucking operator Dragan Simovski to three years in prison for his role in an illegal double-brokering scheme.
Simovski admitted that he had claimed that Freedom would transport freight with its own trucks, when in actuality they didn’t own any trucks. Simovski’s role in the scheme was to enter into contracts with companies on Freedom’s behalf, then providing the information to a co-conspirator broker who would then find other companies to transport the freight. Simovski and his co-conspirator would then bill the companies as if Freedom had performed the job, knowing that the companies that had actually done the work would not be paid in many cases. The loss to these companies is $532,000.
In addition to 3 years in prison, Simonvski was ordered to a 36 month supervised release. He was also ordered to repay the $532,000 to the unpaid trucking companies.
Source:
Office of Inspector General