The co-owner of a trash company was sentenced earlier this week in federal court for defrauding the operator of the Fall River Landfill out of approximately $463,000 in disposal fees.

Stephen P. Aguiar Jr., 47, of Westport, was sentenced to one year and one day in prison, two years of supervised release and ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $463,407. Aguiar pleaded guilty to three counts of mail fraud in April 2017.

Aguiar was one of the owners and operators of Cleanway Disposal & Recycling Inc., a trash removal and recycling company located in Westport, and JS Aguiar Enterprises Inc., a construction and equipment rental company, also located in Westport. Aguiar contracted with the company operating the Fall River Landfill to dispose of trash collected from his private clients in Fall River for one rate, and to dispose of trash collected from his private clients outside of Fall River for a higher rate. Aguiar also contracted with the city of Fall River to collect trash from the Fall River Housing Authority (FRHA). The company operating the landfill did not charge the city of Fall River disposal fees to dump trash collected from FRHA.

Aguiar claimed he was disposing trash from the FRHA between 2009 and 2014, when in fact he was disposing trash collected from his private clients. In other instances, Aguiar claimed he was disposing trash collected from private clients inside of Fall River, when in fact he was disposing trash collected from private clients outside of Fall River. Aguiar thereby defrauded the operator of the Fall River Landfill of approximately $463,000 in revenue.