{"id":2262557,"date":"2024-06-07T18:02:02","date_gmt":"2024-06-07T22:02:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/five-found-guilty-in-40-million-scheme-to-steal-from-federal-food-aid-program\/"},"modified":"2024-06-07T18:02:10","modified_gmt":"2024-06-07T22:02:10","slug":"five-found-guilty-in-40-million-scheme-to-steal-from-federal-food-aid-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/five-found-guilty-in-40-million-scheme-to-steal-from-federal-food-aid-program\/","title":{"rendered":"Five convicted in $40 million federal food aid theft scheme"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ffive-found-guilty-in-40-million-scheme-to-steal-from-federal-food-aid-program%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2262557&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div data-td-block-uid=\"tdi_79\">\n<p>After a seven-week trial, a jury found five defendants guilty for their part in <a href=\"http:\/\/washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/fraud\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>exploiting<\/a> government funding for a program created to feed low-income children after school and during the summer.<\/p>\n<p>The defendants received more than $40 million from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/usda\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>Department of Agriculture <\/a>for 18 million meals at 50 food\u00a0sites across <a href=\"http:\/\/washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/minnesota\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>Minnesota<\/a>, which was overseen by the nonprofit organizations Partners in Nutrition and Feeding Our Future.<\/p>\n<p>Two defendants tried in the case were found not guilty. An additional 63 individuals charged for their part in the scheme are still awaiting trial.\u00a0The FBI has claimed it is the largest COVID-19 pandemic fraud case in the country with $250 million allegedly stolen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe verdict confirms what we\u2019ve known all along, which is that defendants falsified documents, they lied and they fraudulently claimed to be feeding millions of meals to children in Minnesota during COVID,\u201d Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Thompson <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fox9.com\/news\/feeding-our-future-verdict?taid=6663518bb543f000011197d1&#038;utm_campaign=trueanthem&#038;utm_medium=trueanthem\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>said<\/a> in a news conference after the verdicts were read in Minneapolis. \u201cThe defendants took advantage of the COVID-19 pandemic to defraud the state of Minnesota and to steal tens of millions of dollars.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/washingtonexaminer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title><strong>CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>A total of 41 counts, including money laundering and wire fraud, were brought against the seven defendants. Prosecutors argued that the defendants submitted fake invoices and rosters of made-up children\u2019s names. More than 30 witnesses were called to testify, saying how very little to no meals were served, and FBI agents said they traced money used for personal expenses.<\/p>\n<p>The jury was sequestered for four nights after one of the jurors said a woman dropped $120,000 in cash in front of her home. The juror, 23, said the woman offered her more money if she were to find the defendants not guilty. The juror was dismissed from the case and so was another juror who found out about the incident from a family member.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After a seven-week trial, a jury convicted five individuals for misusing government funds intended to feed low-income children in Minnesota. They fraudulently obtained over $40 million from the Department of Agriculture for 18 million meals across 50 sites<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2542,"featured_media":2262558,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/AP24155638384882.jpg.optimal.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2262557","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/AP24155638384882.jpg.optimal.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262557","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2542"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2262557"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2262557\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2262558"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2262557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2262557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2262557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}