Minnesota jury convicts alleged ringleader of massive pandemic food fraud scheme on all counts

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A jury found the alleged ringleader of a massive pandemic fraud case in Minnesota guilty on all counts Wednesday for her role in a scheme that federal prosecutors say stole $250 million from a program meant to feed children in need.

Aimee Bock — founder of Feeding our Future, the group at the heart of the plot — was one of 70 defendants charged in the overall case, which prosecutors said was the nation's single largest fraud scheme against COVID-19 relief programs.

The Minnesota case has also drawn attention for an attempt to bribe a juror in an earlier trial and witness tampering in Bock's trial, which began last month. Thirty-seven defendants have already pleaded guilty, while five were convicted in a group of defendants who were tried last year.

The jury also convicted a co-defendant, Salim Ahmed Said, owner of the now-defunct Safari Restaurant in Minneapolis.

Bock, 44, and Said, 36, were charged with multiple counts involving conspiracy, wire fraud and bribery. Said was also charged with money laundering. Bock allegedly pocketed nearly $2 million, while Said was accused of taking around $5 million. They both maintained their innocence and testified at trial.

U.S. District Judge Nancy Brasel ordered them both held without bail pending their sentencing, for which she did not set a date.

“It was the largest COVID fraud scheme in the country, and what Bock and and her co-defendants did was reprehensible.” Lisa Kirkpatrick the acting U.S. attorney for Minnesota, said at a news conference afterward.

“During COVID, while so many were trying to be helpers, Bock and Said were thieves,” she continued. “They used a time of crisis as their golden opportunity to enrich themselves and their criminal partners — outlandishly so. At every step of the way, Bock fought to keep her fraud scheme going. Today her efforts to lie, to blame others, to escape responsibility, all came to an end.”

Bock's attorney, Kenneth Udoibok, said there will be an appeal. While he has not decided what legal grounds might be used as its basis, he told The Associated Press that the jury could not have fairly considered all six weeks' worth of evidence in the few hours they deliberated after getting the case Wednesday morning.

But lead prosecutor Joe Thompson called the scheme “brazen and corrupt” and told reporters it tarnished Minnesota's reputation for good governance and civic mindedness as well as its high quality of life and low crime.

“The Feeding Our Future case has come to symbolize the problem of fraud in our state,” Thompson said. “It has become the shame of Minnesota. Hopefully today’s verdict will help turn the page in this awful chapter in our state’s history.”

Democratic Gov. Tim Walz, who came under heavy criticism from Republicans who said his administration should have caught the fraud earlier, told reporters he remains “furious” with “criminals that preyed on the system that was meant to feed children.” But he pointed out that nobody in state government, which administered the federal funding, was ever charged in the case.

“We just need to make sure that we put up more firewalls, more security, more ability to make sure that these criminals aren’t able to prey on this,” Walz said.

Thompson said authorities have recovered only about $60 million of the $250 million that was stolen. He declined to speculate on what prosecutors might recommend for sentences but said Bock and Said face “substantial” prison time.

The defendants are being tried in several groups. The first trial was marred by an alleged attempt by some defendants and people linked with them to bribe a juror with a bag of $120,000 in cash. That juror went straight to police. That led to tighter security for Bock’s trial and additional precautions ordered by the judge.

Despite all that, an allegation of witness tampering surfaced midway through the proceedings. A defendant scheduled for trial in August approached a government witness who was due to testify against Bock and Said and asked to speak with him in a courthouse bathroom. That witness declined and instead told his lawyer, who informed prosecutors.

That defendant, Abdinasir Abshir, 32, of Lakeville, soon agreed to plead guilty to a wire fraud charge and to have his tampering attempt factored into a longer sentencing recommendation, which isn’t binding on the judge.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson, center, answers questions during a press conference at the Minneapolis federal courthouse, Wednesday, March 19, 2025, in Minneapolis, after a jury found the alleged ringleader of a massive pandemic fraud case guilty on all counts Wednesday for her role in a scheme that federal prosecutors say stole $250 million from a program meant to feed children in need. (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)

Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Thompson, center, answers questions during a press conference at the Minneapolis federal courthouse on Wednesday, March 19, 2025, in Minneapolis, addressing developments in the Feeding Our Future fraud case. (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)

Acting U.S. Attorney Lisa Kirkpatrick, center, speaks during a press conference at the Minneapolis federal courthouse, Wednesday, March 19, 2025, in Minneapolis, after a jury found the alleged ringleader of a massive pandemic fraud case in Minnesota guilty on all counts for her role in a scheme that federal prosecutors say stole $250 million from a program meant to feed children in need. (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)

Assistant U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson, center, answers questions during a press conference at the Minneapolis federal courthouse, Wednesday, March 19, 2025, in Minneapolis, after a jury found the alleged ringleader of a massive pandemic fraud case guilty on all counts Wednesday for her role in a scheme that federal prosecutors say stole $250 million from a program meant to feed children in need. (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)

Salim Said, co-owner of Safari Restaurant in Minneapolis, arrives at the Minneapolis federal courthouse on Wednesday, March 19, 2025, in Minneapolis, Minn., as legal proceedings continue in the Feeding Our Future fraud case. (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)

The plaza outside the Diana E. Murphy United States Courthouse in Minneapolis is shown covered in snow on Friday, March 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Steve Karnowski)

Aimee Bock, founder and executive director of the nonprofit organization Feeding Our Future, arrives at the Minneapolis federal courthouse with her attorney, Ken Udoibok, right, on Wednesday, March 19, 2025, in Minneapolis, Minn. (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon’s intelligence and law enforcement arms are investigating what it says are leaks of national security information. Defense Department personnel could face polygraphs in the latest such inquiry by the Trump administration.

A memo late Friday from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s chief of staff referred to “recent unauthorized disclosures” of such information, but provided no details about alleged leaks. Earlier in the day, President Donald Trump rejected reports that adviser Elon Musk would be briefed on how the United States would fight a hypothetical war with China.

“If this effort results in information identifying a party responsible for an unauthorized disclosure," then such information “will be referred to the appropriate criminal entity for criminal prosecution,” according to the memo.

At the Homeland Security Department, Secretary Kristi Noem pledged this month to step up lie detector tests on employees in an effort to identify those who may be leaking information about operations to the media.

The Justice Department on Friday announced an investigation into “the selective leak of inaccurate, but nevertheless classified, information" from intelligence agencies about Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang whose members in the United States are being targeted for removal by the Republican administration.

Leaks occur in every administration — and government officials can be the source — as a trial balloon to test how a potential policy decision will be received.

While polygraph exams are typically not admissible in court proceedings, they are frequently used by federal law enforcement agencies and for national security clearances. In 1998, the Supreme Court ruled they were also inadmissible in military justice proceedings.

They are inadmissible because they are unreliable and often result in false positives, said George Maschke, a former Army interrogator and reserve intelligence officer who went on to found AntiPolygraph.org. Mashke failed a polygraph himself when applying to the FBI.

But they have been intermittently used since the 1990s to intimidate and scare sources from talking to reporters, Maschke said. A 1999 Pentagon report said it was expanding the program to use polygraphs on defense personnel “if classified information they had access to has been leaked."

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth does a television interview outside the White House, Friday, March 21, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)