Nine Charged in CDL Scam in Pennsylvania

A U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania charged nine defendants with knowingly producing, attempting to produce, conspiring to produce and aiding and abetting the production of false Pennsylvania commercial driver's licenses.

The case names nine defendants, including Vitaliy Kroshnev and Tatyana Kroshnev, who owned and operated the International Training Academy, which provided training to those seeking Pennsylvania CDLs, according to court documents. Tair Rustamov, another defendant named in the case, provided training to ITA customers in commercial vehicles leased by ITA.

Other defendants include Irina Peterson, Iryna Starovoyt and Khrystyna Davyda, who worked as foreign language interpreters who assisted Pennsylvania CDL applicants taking the required written test administrated by PennDOT.

Court documents say the Kroshnevs helped people obtain false CDLs under the auspices of ITA. The couple also conspired to provide false residency documents to individuals outside of the state, so they could first obtain Pennsylvania driver's licenses before applying for state CDLs.

Peterson, Starovoyt and Davyda helped over 300 out-of-state applicants cheat on the written test, documents said.

With the help of three other defendants, Peterson, Starovoyt and Davyda provided false Pennsylvania residency locations for customers of ITA to assist them in obtaining state driver's licenses.

All defendants were arrested; two were released on $50,000 unsecured bond, two on bond secured by real estate and five were held for further hearings, according to reports by the Philadelphia Daily News.