Broker sentenced 11 years for defrauding carriers

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Updated Apr 19, 2023

A California broker who continued defrauding carriers even after being indicted for it has been sentenced to 10 years and 10 months in prison.

On March 28, U.S. District Judge Lawrence K. Karlton of the state’s Eastern District delivered the sentence to Kulwant Singh Gill, 53, and ordered him to pay $443,388 in restitution to his victims.

The Antelope resident owned and operated companies authorized to transport freight and to broker interstate loads, according to a federal justice department release. During 2004 and 2005, Gill applied for motor carrier broker licenses using false names, social security numbers and driver’s license number

He used Internet-based load boards to find freight and would offer to transport loads for a fixed price. Gill then would repost the loads on the same website or other sites, acting as a broker seeking another company willing to transport it.

In more than a 100 instances, Gill allowed trucking companies to make the deliveries and received payment from the original brokers, who believed Gill had completed the deliveries himself. He then would refuse to pay the carriers that actually transported the freight.

A grand jury originally indicted Gill in 2006, but he continued the scheme during pretrial release, which led to the 2008 indictment. He pleaded guilty in 2009 to charges involving the scheme in two separate indictments. In total, Gill was convicted on eight counts of wire fraud and five counts of making false statements to a government agency.

The court also ordered Gill to enter a 500-hour Bureau of Prisons substance abuse treatment program and to be placed on 36 months probation following completion of his sentence.

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