{"id":17034,"date":"2024-12-10T03:27:12","date_gmt":"2024-12-10T03:27:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/colorado-business-and-owner-sentenced-for-deleting-pollution-controls-from-344-commercial-vehicles-in-large-scale-conspiracy\/"},"modified":"2024-12-10T03:27:12","modified_gmt":"2024-12-10T03:27:12","slug":"colorado-business-and-owner-sentenced-for-deleting-pollution-controls-from-344-commercial-vehicles-in-large-scale-conspiracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/colorado-business-and-owner-sentenced-for-deleting-pollution-controls-from-344-commercial-vehicles-in-large-scale-conspiracy\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado business and owner sentenced for deleting pollution controls from 344 commercial vehicles in &#8216;large-scale conspiracy&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-td-block-uid=\"tdi_84\">\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\">\n<p>A Colorado company and its owner were sentenced in connection with a \u201cwidespread conspiracy\u201d to tamper with emissions controls on hundreds of diesel trucks across the U.S.<\/p>\n<p>On December 5, 2024, Troy Lake Sr. was sentenced to 12 months and 1 day in custody and a fine of $2,500, according to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/usao-co\/pr\/windsor-colorado-business-owner-and-company-sentenced-conspiring-delete-emissions\">U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office for the District of Colorado<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Elite Diesel Service Inc. (Elite), a company owned by Lake, was sentenced to make a payment of $12,500 to a program operated by the Colorado Department of Public Health and the Environment to repair the emissions control systems on vehicles owned by low-income drivers who cannot afford to bring their vehicles into compliance.<\/p>\n<p>Lake and Elite previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the Clean Air Act.<\/p>\n<p>Officials say that between January 2017 and December 2020, Elite and Lake instructed Elite employees to disable the computerized on-board diagnostic (OBD) systems on at least 344 heavy-duty commercial trucks.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cElite\u2019s co-conspirators,\u00a0companies that operated diesel truck garages or diesel truck fleets, had disabled the emissions control hardware on these trucks and hired Elite and Lake to manipulate the OBDs so that the OBDs would not detect the malfunctions,\u201d the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office said.<\/p>\n<p>Lake and Elite were involved in \u201ca widespread conspiracy to tamper with emission controls on diesel trucks across the country\u201d involving eight co-conspirators located in seven different states  who were previously been sentenced, federal authorities said. These co-conspirators who cooperated with the government investigation were sentenced to probation, fines, and payments towards community service projects, including:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Endrizzi Diesel LLC of Bolivar, MO, was assessed a penalty of $220,000 including a fine and a community service payment to the Walnut Grove, MO School District to help replace old school buses with newer and cleaner school buses.<\/li>\n<li>Pro Diesel Inc. of Des Moines, IA, was assessed a penalty of $155,000 including a fine and a community service payment to the Des Moines Area Community College to fund development of curricula to train diesel mechanics on servicing emissions controls.<\/li>\n<li>McDermid Sales &amp; Service Inc. of Oconto Falls, WI, was assessed a penalty of $112,500 including a fine and a community service payment to the Oconto Falls School District to help replace old school buses with newer and cleaner school buses.<\/li>\n<li>Hammes Repair Inc. of Seneca, KS, was assessed a penalty of $117,500 including a fine and a community service payment to the Kansas Department of Health &amp; Environment for the purchase of electric groundskeeping equipment to replace old gas-fired equipment.<\/li>\n<li>Crossroads Repair Inc. of Jamestown, ND, was assessed a penalty of $97,500 including a fine and a community service payment to the Jamestown Rural Fire Department to help replace an old firefighting truck with a newer and cleaner truck.<\/li>\n<li>ATP Oilfield Services LLC of Fort Lupton, CO, was assessed a penalty of $107,500 including a fine and a community service payment to the CDPHE program to repair emissions controls on vehicles owned by low-income drivers.<\/li>\n<li>Beatty Bodyworks Inc. of Oklahoma City, OK, was assessed a fine of $15,000 based on defendant\u2019s inability to pay a higher fine.<\/li>\n<li>Perkins Diesel LLC of Strafford, MO, was assessed a penalty of $95,500 including a fine and a community service payment to the Walnut Grove, MO School District to help replace old school buses with newer and cleaner school buses.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u201cFor years, the defendants led a large-scale conspiracy designed to violate the Clean Air Act by defeating emissions control equipment on hundreds of heavy-duty commercial trucks,\u201d said Special Agent in Charge Lance Ehrig of the Environmental Protection Agency\u2019s Criminal Investigation Division in Colorado. \u201cThe actions by the defendants and their co-conspirators directly resulted in a significant increase in excess pollution, which diminished air quality and further placed vulnerable populations at risk of developing adverse health conditions. Today\u2019s sentencing demonstrates that individuals and companies who violate our nation\u2019s environmental laws and threaten our nation\u2019s air quality will be held criminally responsible for their actions.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/cdllife.com\/2024\/colorado-business-and-owner-sentenced-for-deleting-emissions-controls-from-344-commercial-vehicles\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Colorado company and its owner were sentenced in connection with a \u201cwidespread conspiracy\u201d to tamper with emissions controls on hundreds of diesel trucks across the U.S. On December 5, 2024, Troy Lake Sr. was sentenced to 12 months and 1 day in custody and a fine of $2,500, according to the U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17035,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-weather"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17034"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17034"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17034\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pro-truckdrivers.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}