Trucking company denies bribes for undocumented cargo after receiver calls police on extra boxes in trailer

Police in Ohio are investigating an incident after a receiver called the police on extra boxes inside of a trailer delivering to their facility. 

Police were called to a logistics company on Lancaster Road at 3:18 p.m. on January 22nd after employees noticed extra boxes in the trailer they were unloading. The company says it had paid for the trailer to be used exclusively for a load of truck switches to be delivered from Hidalgo, Texas to their facility in Chillicothe, Ohio. 

According to Scioto Valley Guardian, the traffic manager at the facility told deputies that the truck driver, an employee of the trucking company, had initially denied picking up any extra cargo, but later admitted to receiving $1,500 to haul undocumented items to Chicago after dropping the legitimate load off in Chillicothe. The truck driver had been paid by someone at the warehouse in Hidalgo. 

After the exchange between the truck driver and logistics company, the truck driver reportedly became aggressive and left the facility with the trailer at around 10 a.m. Police determined that the semi truck in question belonged to Aries Logistics, and tracked the truck to a gas station in Champaign, Illinois. The company owner and chief administrative officer were at the scene when police arrived. 

The trucking company denied the bribery and smuggling allegations, stating that the driver who had picked up the load in Hidalgo was different than the driver at the gas station. The company also called the contract involved in the questionable load “important” and said that smuggling narcotics as a part of that load was not likely. 

The trucking company then emailed photos of the described extra cargo with shipping documents describing the cargo as plastic granules from Montgomery, Illinois on their way to Pharr, Texas. This information did not match the truck’s route of the observed cargo. The incident has been forwarded to the US 23 Major Crimes Task Force for further investigation.