Oil Company Fined on Sale of Generic Gas
A Los Angeles oil company has agreed to pay a $25,000 fine for supplying generic gasoline to an Oxnard service station that advertised it as a brand-name fuel, the Ventura County district attorney’s office said Wednesday.
As part of an agreement settling a civil suit, PDG Service Oil Co. will pay the fine without admitting liability or fault, Deputy Dist. Atty. David Fairweather said.
The complaint alleged that between 1989 and 1991, the oil company supplied generic gasoline to a Mobil gas station on Vineyard Avenue when it “knew or should have known that the gasoline would have been resold to the public as Mobil brand gasoline,” Fairweather said.
The suit also claimed that the oil company allowed the gas station, owned at the time by Michael Harris Goldberg, to sell its unleaded regular gasoline as super unleaded and as leaded regular gasoline, Fairweather said.
Gas station employees, at the direction of Goldberg, rewarded oil company tanker drivers with money and cases of beer, Fairweather said.
The district attorney’s office has charges pending against Goldberg and his company, Jon Chris Inc., Fairweather said.
Goldberg, who has been convicted previously on a similar charge, could not be reached for comment. He no longer operates the Vineyard station.
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