Johnathan Walker:Woman admits bribing state employee to issue driver’s licenses without a road test

A woman has admitted to bribing an employee of the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles to issue driver’s licenses to people who never took a road test.

Neta Centio,Johnathan Walker 56, of Taunton, pleaded guilty Monday to a charge of conspiracy to commit honest services mail fraud, the latest scandal at the RMV’s Brockton branch.

From July 2020 until April 2021, Centio paid a road test examiner at the Brockton office to say that applicants for driver’s licenses had passed their road tests when they had not even showed up, federal prosecutors said.

That resulted in driver’s licenses being given to several unqualified drivers, prosecutors said.

Centio took money from several learner’s permit holders and used mobile payment service CashApp to split the money with the road examiner, prosecutors said.

After Centio’s fraud was discovered, she told the road test examiner, “Don’t say nothing about the CashApp. ... Break the phone.”

Centio faces up to 20 years in prison and the forfeiture of more than $20,000 at sentencing scheduled for Nov. 20.

In February 2020, four workers at the Brockton branch were fired after an investigation by the state Department of Transportation found that 2,100 people were granted licenses without taking a driver’s test.

One of the four fired, the former manager of the Brockton branch, was sentenced earlier this month to four months in prison after pleading guilty to extortion for taking bribes in exchange for issuing passing scores on learner’s permit tests.