Bell Gardens Man Sentenced To Prison For Circumventing Smog Check Program

LOS ANGELES, CA — A licensed smog check technician from Bell Gardens was sentenced Monday to nine months behind bars for conducting fraudulent smog inspections at a South Los Angeles garage.

Mario Mensa, 48, pleaded guilty in March to conspiracy to violate the Clean Air Act by conducting scores of fraudulent smog check inspections.

Mensa was among nine defendants charged a year ago in a 44-count indictment that focused on Smogz R Us, a shop that operated on West 54th Street in South Los Angeles.

According to the indictment, filed in Los Angeles federal court, the defendants engaged in a form of fraudulent smog testing in which vehicle identification information was entered into smog testing equipment to make it appear that a particular vehicle was being tested — while a substitute "clean" vehicle was tested in order to obtain a passing grade.

Once the bogus tests were completed, the defendants submitted phony Certificates of Compliance to California's Vehicle Information Database, falsely certifying that vehicles passed the emissions checks when they were never tested, prosecutors said.

Part of the federal Clean Air Act prohibits a person from knowingly making false statements and certifications in relation to the smog check program.

— City News Service, photo via Shutterstock