FRESNO, Calif. -- Imagine for a moment you own a trucking company, instead of a motorcoach operation, and want to show your wife how much you love her by buying her a new BMW.

Also imagine youre having a tough time paying for the fuel your company uses when the price seems to jump a little every day; meanwhile, you need a little extra income.

On the other hand, maybe youre just greedy and want to make more money.

To satisfy all these needs you ask -- and then require -- your drivers to falsify their logbooks so they can run longer than allowed.

So far so good. But then, a problem appears in the form of a DOT officer knocking on your door. The DOT is doing an audit when word comes to the officer that one of your drivers has been involved in a fatal accident.

Of course the DOT becomes very interested in what caused the fatality and since theyre already there, they soon discover what you have been hiding.

A few weeks ago, such a scenario played out in California.

Surinder S. Nijjar, owner and president of Nijjar Brothers Trucking Inc. of Madera, was sentenced in U.S. District Court here to serve 12 months in prison and 36 months supervised probation and fined $5,000 for false statements, aiding and abetting.

Amritpal Singh, co-owner of Nijjar Brothers, was sentenced to 12 months probation and fined $5,000 for the same offenses.

As it turned out, Nijjar Brothers Trucking routinely encouraged its drivers to falsify logbooks, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General.

The same day USDOT agents executed the first of two search warrants on Nijjar Brothers, one of the companys drivers had caused a four-vehicle collision, killing a father and his 13-year-old son and seriously injuring his 17-year-old son. The driver had been driving for at least 19 hours; he was convicted and sentenced for falsifying logbook entries and served time in jail.

As part of the sentencing agreement, the two owners also are required to inactivate their DOT numbers, dissolve their companies, not have any ownership or interest in a trucking company during the periods of their probation, and each pay a fine of $50,000 on behalf of their companies.