Keith R. Smith

A Cranberry Township auto repair shop owner was sentenced Thursday to pay more than $7,000 in total restitution to at least five of his customers for renting out their vehicles instead of repairing them.

Township resident Keith R. Smith, 68, was sentenced to pay $7,376 in restitution and serve 72 months of probation after pleading guilty to seven counts of unauthorized use of a vehicle and one count of deceptive business practices filed by township police between November 2021 and October 2022.

Smith, who operates Oilology, rented out his customers’ vehicles for as much as $300 a month, according to police.

Some of the victims testified in preliminary hearings that the problems for which they took their cars to Smith’s shop for were not fixed when they got their cars back.

In addition, some of the victims received bills for turnpike tolls and traffic citations incurred while their vehicles were supposed to have been at Smith’s shop. Some of the vehicles had thousands of more miles on their odometers than they did when they were taken to his shop, according to testimony.

Two victims attended the sentencing, but did not address Smith or the court.

Common Pleas Court Judge Timothy McCune ordered Smith to pay restitution in five of the seven cases. No restitution was requested in two of the cases. The sentence included six concurrent terms of 24 months probation, one concurrent term of 48 months probation and a consecutive term of 24 months probation.

Smith did not speak before he was sentenced.