Three Plead Guilty to Wire Fraud in $250 Million Feeding Our Future Fraud Scheme

MINNEAPOLIS - Haji Osman Salad, Sharmarke Issa, and Khadra Abdi pleaded guilty to their roles in the $250 million fraud scheme that exploited a federally-funded child nutrition program during the COVID-19 pandemic, announced United States Attorney Andrew M. Luger.

According to court documents, Salad, 34, the owner and operator of Haji's Kitchen LLC, enrolled in the Federal Child Nutrition Program under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future and Sponsor A. Salad and his co-conspirators, including Issa, 42, and Abdi, 42, opened sites across the state of Minnesota, as well as multiple shell companies, which were used to facilitate the fraud scheme.

Between June 2020 through 2022, Salad falsely claimed that Haji's Kitchen was a food vendor for more than 15 million meals to various Federal Child Nutrition Program sites in Minnesota. Co-defendants, Issa and Kawsar Jama were among the largest recipients of purported food from Salad. For example, in November 2021, Salad created fraudulent food invoices falsely claiming that he supplied Kawsar Jama's Pelican Rapids site, a small town in west-central Minnesota with a population of approximately 2,500 people, with $293,300 worth of food for 140,000 meals and snacks. In total, Salad fraudulently received approximately $11,483,827 in Federal Child Nutrition Program funds, which he spent on real estate and luxury vehicles.

According to court documents, Issa, the principal of Minnesota's Somali Community and Wacan Restaurant LLC, fraudulently received Federal Child Nutrition Program funds under the sponsorship of Sponsor A and Feeding Our Future, respectively. As part of the scheme, Issa used fraudulent records and food invoices to falsely claim his sites served at least 2.3 million meals to children. Issa also operated other entities such as ANS Projects LLC and Bubah Baraka Properties LLC which he used to launder proceeds of the fraud scheme to purchase assets, primarily real estate, which had nothing to do with feeding children. For example, Issa acquired, among other properties, a $785,000 private residence for himself located in Edina. In total, Issa fraudulently received approximately $3,586,231 in Federal Child Nutrition Program funds.

According to court documents, Abdi, was the principal of Shafi'i Tutoring & Homework Help Center, which was registered as a meal site under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future. Between April 2020 and December 2021, Abdi fraudulently claimed entitlement to $3,479,191.92 in Federal Child Nutrition Program funds. However, relatively little of this money was used by Abdi to purchase food.

Salad, Issa, and Abdi each pleaded guilty to wire fraud this week in U.S. District Court before Judge Nancy E. Brasel. Sentencing hearings will be scheduled at a later time.

This case is the result of an investigation conducted by the FBI, IRS - Criminal Investigations, and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Matthew S. Ebert, Joseph H. Thompson, and Harry M. Jacobs are prosecuting the case.