A Mount Crawford, Va.-based trucking company that hauled United States mail and its holding company have been ordered to pay more than $3 million in owed money and driver pay restitution for a fraud scheme that lasted for 18 years.

Beam Bros. Trucking and Beam Bros. Holding were jointly sentenced along with its four most senior officers, the president, vice president, chief financial officer, and chief operating officer.

The company was ordered to forfeit to the government $2 million of fraudulently obtained proceeds and pay $1 million in restitution to drivers who were defrauded of their pay. The companies were also sentenced to serve 3 years of corporate probation and pay a fine of $250,000.

Beam Trucking and Beam Holding President Gerald Wayne Beam and Vice President Garland Crawford Beam were each sentenced to serve six months of home confinement followed by three years of supervised release. Beam Trucking COO Shaun Crawford Beam and CFO Nickolas Gene Kozel were each sentenced to serve three months of home confinement followed by three years of supervised release.

BBT was one of the largest contract mail carriers for the U.S. Postal Service. Earlier this year, the company and its top officers pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges related to knowingly committing offences against the U.S. and Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration regulations. Beam pled guilty to defrauding its drivers by falsifying their time sheets so that they would report fewer hours worked and falsified driver hours of service.

According to evidence presented at the sentencing hearing, the Beam brothers created routes that were illegal and instructed drivers to drive on them. The routes were so long that drivers received barely any sleep for weeks at a time.

On a number of occasions, Beam Bros. drivers were so fatigued that they barely avoided crashes when they momentarily fell asleep while driving trucks on public highways. One driver was so fatigued that he took the drugs known as Bath Salts every few hours to stay awake. After three months of taking drugs, the driver said that he could no longer physically drive a truck and had to call for a medical rescue while on a trip.