3 former Pilot Flying J employees plead guilty to fraud

Three former employees at truck stop chain Pilot Flying J., based in Knoxville, Tenn., have pleaded guilty to fraud. The case has been expanded to include charges against 10 former employees who have been accused of skimming off of fuel rebates, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported Tuesday. The three who pleaded guilty Monday include Brian Mosher, the company's national director of sales, the newspaper said. Lexie Holden, an accounts representative, and Christopher Andrews, a regional sales representative from Texas, also pleaded guilty. All 10 of the people charged have agreed to cooperate with authorities. Mosher's guilty plea says he skimmed $7 million to $20 million from rebates involving as many as 250 customers. Andrews' plea does not specify how much in losses or how many customers he was involved in scamming, the newspaper said. Holden's admitted she was responsible for defrauding as many as 50 customers. Pilot Flying J is owned by the Haslam family, which includes Cleveland Browns owner Jimmy Haslam. The company paid $85 million in 2013 to settle complaints with trucking companies. The deal included Pilot paying what the companies were owed, their legal expenses and 6 percent interest. The FBI began looking into the fraud scheme in May 2011 after an informant said the company was defrauding companies "too unsophisticated to catch that their agreed-upon deal with Pilot was being changed to benefit Pilot without the knowledge of those customers," an affidavit says. The document says Mosher was recorded telling employees in a sales meeting: "Know your customer. If the guy's sophisticated and he truly has gone out and gotten deals form other competitors and he's getting daily prices from us, don't jack his discount, because he's going to know, okay?"