Massachusetts driving school owner sentenced to prison in $17,000 driver’s license bribery scheme

BOSTON – A Brockton man was sentenced today in federal court in Boston.

According to the Massachusetts Department of Justice, 61-year-old Estevao Semedo was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani to six months in prison and one year of supervised release, with the first six months to be served in home confinement. Semedo was also ordered to pay a $17,000 forfeiture money judgment. In April 2023, Semedo pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit honest services mail fraud.

Semedo, the owner of a driving school, conspired to defraud the RMV into issuing driver’s licenses to applicants who did not pass the road test. Specifically, Semedo paid a road test examiner at the Brockton RMV service center to misrepresent to the RMV that certain driver’s license applicants had passed their road test when, in fact, they had not. Some of the applicants did not even show up to take the test. As a result of the fraud, the RMV mailed driver’s licenses to unqualified applicants. In total, Semedo paid the road test examiner $17,000 in bribes in exchange for fraudulent passing scores on road tests.

Acting United States Attorney Joshua S. Levy; Michael J. Krol, Acting Special Agent in Charge of Homeland Security Investigations in New England; and U.S. Department of Transportation, Office of Inspector General’s Special Agent-in-Charge Christopher A. Scharf made the announcement today. The investigation was conducted by Homeland Security Investigation’s Document and Benefit Fraud Task Force (DBFTF). Valuable assistance was provided by the Mattapoisett Police Department. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Christine Wichers and Adam Deitch of the Public Corruption & Special Prosecutions Unit prosecuted the case.