Pilot Flying J CEO Jimmy Haslam ‘knew-absolutely” about the rebate scam and “loved it,” according to a former Flying J executive in a recorded conversation released in court on Tuesday.
The audio recording was released on November 14th, in court in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where Mark Hazelwood, former Pilot Flying J President, along with 3 subordinate employees are standing trial on charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, as well as conspiracy to commit mail fraud.
Pilot Flying J was raided by the government in 2013 following a fuel rebate scam during which the company conned truckers and trucking companies out of millions of dollars by promising the delivery of fuel rebates that were never intended to arrive.
The trial began last week and is expected to last through December.
According to Knox News, in the recorded conversation between former Pilot flying J Vice President of sales John “Stick” Freeman and Sales Executive Vincent Greco, Freeman makes the following statement to Greco, who is secretly wearing a wire for the FBI:
“We’ve all had cases where we’ve gotten busted…. It wasn’t a secret… I mean, I called Jimmy and told him I got busted at Western Express … He knew – absolutely. I mean, [Haslam] knew all along that I was cost-plussin’ (code for the fraud scheme) this guy. He knew it all along. Loved it. We were making $450,000 a month on [Western Express].”
In the recording, Freeman also stated that former Pilot Flying J president Mark Hazelwood knew about the fraud as well, and proceeded to brag about how Pilot Flying J smoothed over relations with Western Express by purchasing a broken-down plane for $1 million. He boasted that Pilot Flying J still made $6 million in the deal.
Former Pilot exec: Jimmy Haslam ’loved’ trucking rip-off scheme https://t.co/98fbADFUfn pic.twitter.com/DsUTAMUfZq
— ohiodotcom (@ohiodotcom) November 15, 2017
Despite the audio evidence, Pilot Flying J continues to deny Haslam’s knowledge of the scheme, reissuing a statement saying, “as we have said from the outset, Jimmy Haslam was not aware of any wrongdoing.”
Pilot Flying J has already paid $92 million in fines and $85 million in restitution to the trucking companies that were conned in the scheme.
14 of the 18 people being prosecuted in the case have pled guilty.
