Former examiner sentenced to 2 years in driving certificate fraud
Blanca Tovar also must spend two years on supervised release when her prison term ends, under the sentenced handed down by U.S. District Court Judge Robert L. Echols.
Tovar, who worked at the driver’s license station in the Nashville suburb of Gallatin, pleaded guilty in May to taking bribes from Javier Guzman in return for issuing more than 40 driving certificates to people who hadn’t completed the required testing. She was paid about $400 for each certificate, prosecutors said.
Guzman was sentenced to 18 months in prison in December.
Their cases didn’t become public until this week, when indictments were unsealed in a federal-state investigation called Operation Crooked Highway.
Six people, including two who had been examiners at the Murfreesboro driver’s license station and two who worked for a driving school, were charged Wednesday with a similar scheme of bribes to provide driving documents for illegal immigrants who didn’t live in the state or pass the required tests.
The indictment unsealed Wednesday says that Safety Department employee Bruce Conklin and former employee Teresa Jones took bribes of nearly $30,000 from Bryan Guess and Sheila Robertson of Winchester Driving School.
The indictment also charged Shun Gao with paying cash to the school in exchange for the certificates and Syed Abbas Parvez, an illegal immigrant living in Georgia, with transporting another illegal immigrant from Pakistan to Tennessee to get a fraudulent license through the driving school.
In sentencing Tovar, the judge said the “cottage industry” of producing fraudulent driving documents undermined public confidence in government, endangered safety by giving driving certificates to people who hadn’t completed the testing and threatened security.
“This case demonstrates how state and federal agencies working together can stamp out public corruption and restore public confidence in the integrity of our government at all levels,” U.S. Attorney Jim Vines said.