Jurors in the Feeding Our Future fraud trial were shown pictures Monday of a person popping a champagne bottle at a private beach resort in the Maldives, and images of a Porsche, a Tesla, and a newly built apartment complex in Kenya. A prosecutor argued that several defendants on trial this week spent federal money on those personal expenses instead of using it to feed underserved children.
The defendants allegedly defrauded a federal program aimed at feeding children during the COVID-19 pandemic in order to “line their pockets and exploit a crisis,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Ebert said in his opening statements Monday.
“This case is about an epic outbreak of another sort,” Ebert said. “It’s about lying, lying to get money. In a word: fraud. In the uncertain depth of a pandemic, their fraud went viral.”
Ebert and defense attorneys gave their opening statements Monday in the first Feeding Our Future trial, where seven defendants are charged with allegedly stealing about $40 million from the federal government that was earmarked to feed children.
The defendants are being tried in a joint trial on a total of 41 criminal charges, including wire fraud, bribery and money laundering. The case is part of a much larger investigation into the alleged theft of $250 million from the federal government.
Defense attorneys told jurors that the prosecution’s case is misleading. The federal government had loosened regulations during the pandemic and, with help from sponsor organizations like Feeding Our Future, had approved giving money to food sites and vendors, defense attorneys said.
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The defendants were simply following the rules explained to them, and provided food to people in need, they argued. Attorney Andrew Birrell, who represents defendant Abdiaziz Farah, said entrepreneurs like his client take on risks in hopes of making gains.
“At the end of the day, it’s called profit,” Birrell said. “That’s how we do things in America.”
Testimony also began Monday when Emily Honer, director of Nutrition Program Services for the Minnesota Department of Education, took the witness stand in the late afternoon.
A ‘golden ticket’ to millions
The federal Child Nutrition Program was the defendants’ “golden ticket” to “their own endless ATM,” Ebert told jurors.
Birrell said his client “took the enormous risk” of paying for the cost of providing the meals before getting reimbursed for them by the federal government. Abdiaziz had to wait months at times to receive reimbursements, Birrell said.
“He made a fair profit margin—he did make a lot of money,” Birrell said of his client, Abdiaziz. “And the reason he made money is because he provided the food.”
Patrick Cotter, who represents defendant Mohamed Jama Ismail, said food providers were allowed to deliver bulk food items to families because the government loosened some standards during the pandemic. People were also allowed to arrive at food sites to request food, including bagged groceries, that they then took home, he said, adding that a few bags of groceries could equate to several dozen meals.
Cotter said that under the relaxed rules, someone from a family of seven could request multiple days’ worth of meals for their family, and “could then walk away with 70 meals and 35 snacks in one sitting.”
Ebert, the prosecutor, told jurors that the alleged fraud began when Abdiaziz and Mohamed started a restaurant, Empire Cuisine and Market, in April 2020 when “the rest of the world was shutting down.” He showed a picture of the Shakopee restaurant, which featured a cramped kitchen and four booths.
The two then enrolled the restaurant in the federal food-aid program through two sponsors: Feeding Our Future and Partners in Quality Care. Both organizations were supposed to monitor how the federal money was being used, Ebert explained. But both employed people who enabled and in some cases participated in the fraud, he said.
Ebert explained that one former Feeding Our Future employee exchanged money with the defendants, has pleaded guilty in the case, and will testify in the trial. No employees of Partners in Quality Care have been charged in the case.
Within months of starting Empire Cuisine and Market, Abdiaziz and Mohamed reported that the restaurant was supplying food to dozens of food sites across the state. They submitted invoices with fake names for non-existent children, like “Good Brown” and “John Doe,” who were supposedly fed at the food sites, Ebert said.
Defense attorneys argued that people who received food provided their names but were not required to verify them with an ID. The defendants did not make up the names, argued their attorneys, who also offered a theory about why such a high number of meals were served.
Under relaxed federal rules, defense attorneys told jurors, people did not have to be enrolled in the federal food-aid program in order to show up at sites to request food. That meant people could theoretically show up at multiple sites in a single day, the attorneys said.
“No identification was required to pick up food,” Birrell said. “And these were called ‘open sites.’ That means anybody can come to the site, anybody can show up and pick up food.”
Ebert showed the defendants’ text messages to support the prosecution’s accusations. In one text message, Abdiaziz asked someone about adding another food site to his roster so he could request more money from the government. Organizations received more money with each additional meal they reported serving.
“Capitalism at its finest,” Abdiaziz wrote in the text exchange.
To illustrate the massive scale of the alleged fraud, Ebert outlined the number of children the defendants reported feeding in a single month in a single city—Faribault. The defendants claimed that in May 2020, they served 7,000 meals a day across four food sites, or 426,000 total meals for the entire month. The defendants received more than $1 million in federal money that month. Ebert noted that 4,000 school-age children live in Faribault.
Ebert said the seven defendants provided and served some food, which “shouldn’t be surprising” because some of them ran restaurants. But, he said, prosecutors believe they only provided about 10 percent of the meals they reported to the federal government for financial reimbursement.
Immigrants who defied the odds
Defense attorneys described their clients as refugees from modest backgrounds who defied the odds. Abdiaziz was 2 years old when the civil war in Somalia broke out; his mother was killed by a bomb shortly afterwards. He lived in a refugee camp in Kenya until age 15, Birrell said, where he and his family slept on floor mats in tents and often went hungry.
Yet, he graduated high school on time shortly after arriving in Minnesota, Birrell said, and also earned a business degree from the University of Minnesota. He then used his savings to buy a gas station and halal market, Empire Gas and Market, in 2015.
Mohamed nearly died from hepatitis and hunger during the Somali civil war, Cotter said. He immigrated to Minnesota and worked for 18 years at Polar Industries, where he manufactured computer boards. He realized his dream of owning his own business when he co-founded Empire Gas and Market with Abdiaziz, Cotter said.
Mohamed and Abdiaziz later co-founded Empire Cuisine to drop the gas part of the business, Cotter said, adding that the restaurant mostly fulfills take-out orders.
It’s not uncommon for immigrants who arrive in the United States without many resources to start their own businesses, “because that’s how you make it,” said Frederick Goetz, who is defending Mukhtar Shariff.
To counter the prosecution’s accusations that the defendants created shell companies to launder the federal funds, Goetz told jurors that immigrants sometimes use a business they founded for a different purpose.
Who’s on trial
The defendants on trial are:
- Abdiaziz Farah co-owned Empire Cuisine and Market. Federal prosecutors allege that the Shakopee-based deli and grocery store posed as a meals provider for several food sites, and defrauded the government out of $28 million. Abdiaziz allegedly pocketed more than $8 million for himself. He is also charged with lying on an application to renew his passport after federal agents seized his passport as part of their investigation.
- Mohamed Jama Ismail co-owned Empire Cuisine and Market. Mohamed is Abdiziz’s uncle. He is also owner of MZ Market LLC, which prosecutors allege was a shell company used to launder the stolen money. Mohamed allegedly pocketed $2.2 million. He previously pleaded guilty to passport fraud.
- Abdimajid Nur allegedly created a shell company, Nur Consulting, and laundered stolen money from Empire Cuisine and ThinkTechAct, other alleged shell companies. Abdimajid, who was 21 at the time of his indictment, allegedly pocketed $900,000.
- Hayat Nur allegedly submitted fake meal counts and invoices served at food sites. Court documents identify Hayat as Abdimajid’s sister. Hayat allegedly pocketed $30,000.
- Said Farah co-owned Bushra Wholesalers, which allegedly laundered money by claiming to be a food vendor that provided meals to food sites that then reportedly served children. Court documents identify Said as Abdiaziz’s brother. Said allegedly pocketed more than $1 million.
- Abdiwahab Aftin co-owned Bushra Wholesalers, and allegedly pocketed $435,000.
- Mukhtar Shariff served as CEO of Afrique Hospitality Group, and allegedly used the company to launder stolen money. He allegedly pocketed more than $1.3 million.
The alleged fraud involved the Minnesota Department of Education distributing federal funds to sponsor organizations like Feeding Our Future. The sponsor organizations then dispersed those funds to food vendors and food sites, which were supposed to provide ready-to-eat meals to local children.
Several organizations in the money chain reported serving thousands more meals than they actually did—or simply never served any meals at all—in order to receive more federal money, according to prosecutors. Those funds were then allegedly passed through various shell companies before being pocketed by the perpetrators, who used the money to buy cars, property, and other items.
Eighteen jurors, six of them alternates, are seated for the trial, which is expected to last six to eight weeks. Jury selection took most of last week; several potential jurors were dismissed because they had heard about the high-profile case and had already formed opinions about guilt. A few were dismissed for expressing religious and cultural bias.
The jurors appear to be mostly white, with one person of color, a woman. Nine are men and nine are women. Seventeen jurors are from the Twin Cities seven-county metro area; one lives in Faribault. The group ranges in age from their early 20s to their early 70s.
The trial is part of a much larger fraud case that became public in 2022 when a federal judge unsealed several search warrant affidavits. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for Minnesota announced indictments later that year against 60 defendants, and announced additional indictments in 2023 and 2024.
In total, 70 defendants are charged in the case for allegedly stealing $250 million of child food-aid funds from the federal government. Eighteen defendants have pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing.
Minnesota U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger has called the case the single largest coordinated COVID-19 fraud case in the nation.
