Lakeville Man Pleads Guilty In $250M Fraud, Admits Witness Tampering

MINNEAPOLIS — A Lakeville man has pleaded guilty to wire fraud in the $250 million Feeding Our Future scandal, admitting to fabricating millions of meals for children and attempting to tamper with a witness in a related trial.

Abdinasir Mahamed Abshir, 33, entered his guilty plea Friday in U.S. District Court before Judge Nancy E. Brasel.

As part of his plea, he acknowledged his sentencing guidelines would include an enhancement for obstruction of justice due to his attempt to influence a witness. His sentencing hearing will be scheduled at a later date.

According to investigators, on Feb. 18, Abshir approached a cooperating witness in the trial of his co-defendants in United States v. Aimee Bock and Salim Said.

That day, just outside Courtroom 13W in the U.S. Federal Courthouse in Minneapolis, Abshir confronted the witness moments before their scheduled testimony, urging them to step away to a bathroom for a private conversation.

Beyond his attempt to interfere with the trial, Abshir played a major role in the fraud scheme itself before the U.S. Department of Justice began filing charges.

Between April 2020 and January 2022, Abshir falsely claimed to be running a child nutrition site in Mankato under the name Stigma-Free Mankato, operating under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future.

Soon after launching the site, he fraudulently reported serving meals to 3,000 children daily, seven days a week, from J’s Sambusa, a small restaurant in North Mankato, according to authorities.

He also created a shell company, Horseed Management, falsely listing it as a meal vendor for the program, investigators said.

From November 2020 to November 2021, Abshir and his co-conspirators submitted falsified meal counts, invoices, and attendance rosters, fraudulently claiming to have served approximately 1.6 million meals, according to authorities.

Abshir used the proceeds of the fraud to purchase a 2021 Range Rover, which has since been seized for forfeiture, investigators said.

He also received more than $100,000 in bribes and kickbacks from Horseed Management, according to authorities.

In return, Feeding Our Future collected nearly $420,000 in administrative fees for sponsoring the fraudulent site, investigators said.

In December 2021, Abshir contributed $5,750 to a GoFundMe campaign created by Feeding Our Future founder Aimee Bock, according to prosecutors.

In total, Stigma-Free Mankato received more than $5.4 million in payments from Feeding Our Future based on fraudulent claims, authorities said.