Feeding Our Future was a nonprofit sponsor in the federal child-nutrition programs that the Minnesota Department of Education administered. Prosecutors described a scheme of more than $250 million in fraudulent reimbursement claims during the pandemic. They called it the largest pandemic-era fraud case charged in the country. The nonprofit’s founder, Aimee Bock, was convicted at trial in March 2025 and sentenced in May 2026 to 500 months in prison. The court held her responsible for $242 million in losses.
Prosecutors said sponsors and site operators submitted fake attendance rosters and invoices for meals never served, collected administrative fees, and moved kickbacks through shell companies described as consulting fees. During the first trial in June 2024, someone delivered $120,000 in cash to a juror’s home in a bribery attempt. The juror reported it, and all five people charged in the bribery case pleaded guilty.
Prosecutions ongoing. The lead defendant was sentenced May 21, 2026. She filed her Eighth Circuit opening brief in August 2026, and no appeal decision had been reported as of October 11, 2026. Co-defendant Salim Said is to be sentenced in late October 2026.
Each figure says what it measures. A spending total is not a fraud amount.
What the state and federal books show was paid to the sponsor, year by year, is on What the state paid. What has been seized or ordered repaid in this case is on Where the money is. I have not found a published statewide recovery total.
A starter set of principal defendants, not a complete list. Each status comes from a documented court step.
Founder and executive director, Feeding Our Future
Co-owner, Safari Restaurant (Feeding Our Future site)
Co-owner, Empire Cuisine & Market (Feeding Our Future site)
Co-owner of Bushra Wholesalers, tried in the first Feeding Our Future trial
Defendant in the first Feeding Our Future trial
Charged in the juror bribery case
Charged with delivering the juror bribe
CEO, Future Leaders Early Learning Center (Feeding Our Future meal site)
Principal, Haji’s Kitchen (vendor sponsored by Partners in Nutrition)
Former senior policy aide to the Minneapolis mayor and incorporator of Stigma-Free International
Operator, Stigma-Free Mankato site (Feeding Our Future), and co-defendant in United States v. Bock
Co-owner, ASA Limited (Gurey Deli site, Feeding Our Future), and co-defendant in United States v. Bock
Co-owner, ASA Limited (Gurey Deli site, Feeding Our Future), and co-defendant in United States v. Bock
Shakopee meal-site operator sponsored by Feeding Our Future
Shakopee meal-site operator sponsored by Feeding Our Future
Owner, Metro Area Catering (vendor to Feeding Our Future sites), and the 80th defendant charged
The court record comes first, with the prosecutors' sentencing filing, the Justice Department release, and the judge. After it come what others said about it and what the defense argued.
"Bock unquestionably led the scheme. She recruited myriad participants into the fraud and exploited others to expand the scheme."
Prosecutors’ position on sentencing (22-cr-223, filed May 18, 2026)
Primary source:U.S. Attorney, MinnesotaBock "maintained complete control of Feeding Our Future from an administrative and financial perspective" and "oversaw the spigot of millions of federal dollars flowing into the Feeding Our Future bank account." Scheme participants, the filing says, received "million dollar check after million dollar check," all signed by Bock.
The same filing, on control of the money
Primary source:U.S. Attorney, Minnesota"Feeding Our Future Ringleader Sentenced to 500 Months." A jury convicted Bock on all seven counts on March 19, 2025. She was sentenced May 21, 2026.
The Department of Justice, in its own release title
Primary source:Justice DepartmentPrimary source:U.S. Attorney, MinnesotaOverruled the defense objection to attributing the full loss (about $243 million, per the Pioneer Press, and $242,807,755 in restitution in the judgment) to Bock, because prosecutors provided evidence proving she was central to organizing and planning the scheme.
The sentencing court (Judge Nancy Brasel), per the Pioneer Press
Secondary source:St. Paul Pioneer PressWitnesses at trial described former Feeding Our Future employee Abdikerm Eidleh as a main contact for site operators in the scheme. Bock’s defense pointed at him. Eidleh left the country in 2021 and was taken into custody in Mogadishu in June 2026. He was transferred to Minnesota on July 16, 2026 and pleaded not guilty on July 31, 2026. An August 21, 2026 docket order set pretrial motions due November 27, a status conference November 24, and a motion hearing December 18, 2026. No trial date had been set as of October 11, 2026.
Trial testimony about a charged former employee, as reported
Eidleh is charged and presumed innocent. Descriptions of his role are attributed to trial testimony and charging documents, not adopted as findings.
Secondary source:Star TribunePrimary source:IRS-CI, U.S. Attorney releasePrimary source:U.S. Attorney, MinnesotaSecondary source:FOX 9"prosecutors presented a mountain of evidence that she was indeed the mastermind of the Feeding Our Future fraud"
Attorney General Keith Ellison, at the sentencing
Secondary source:Star TribuneArgued that co-defendants were "the recruiters and organizers of the fraud" and sought a sentence of three years or less. He also told the AP that Bock was "unfairly portrayed as the mastermind." The jury verdict and the 500-month sentence ride alongside this claim.
Defense counsel Kenneth Udoibok
Secondary source:St. Paul Pioneer PressSecondary source:Associated PressFeeding Our Future sues the Minnesota Department of Education in Ramsey County District Court, alleging among other things that the department delayed approving its site applications. On December 22, 2020, by agreement of the parties, the court orders the department to decide site applications “in a reasonably prompt manner.”
The Minnesota Department of Education issues a second set of serious-deficiency findings and stops paying Feeding Our Future’s reimbursement claims. Feeding Our Future moves for a restraining order and to hold the department in contempt. The department lifts the stop on April 30, 2021, after a judge’s April 21 comments, without a court order requiring it.
After the Education Department shares its fraud suspicions, the FBI begins investigating Feeding Our Future, per the Legislative Auditor.
A Ramsey County judge finds the department in contempt of the December 2020 stipulated order over its handling of site applications and orders $47,500 in sanctions and attorney fees. It is the case’s only contempt finding, and it concerns site applications, not the payment stop, which had been lifted two months earlier.
FBI agents, with IRS and Postal Inspection Service investigators, execute 25 search warrants in the Feeding Our Future investigation, first bringing the child-nutrition fraud scheme to public attention.
The U.S. Attorney announces charges against 47 defendants, across six indictments and three criminal informations, alleging a $250 million scheme to exploit a federal child-nutrition program during the pandemic. Those charged are presumed innocent unless convicted.
During the first Feeding Our Future trial, a gift bag with $120,000 cash is handed to a relative of Juror 52 at the juror’s home, as a present in exchange for a not-guilty verdict, per the Justice Department. The juror reports it to police. Five people are later charged, and all five plead guilty.
The Legislative Auditor’s special review finds the Minnesota Department of Education’s inadequate oversight of Feeding Our Future created opportunities for fraud.
A federal jury convicts Feeding Our Future founder Aimee Bock on all 7 counts and co-defendant Salim Said on all counts against him.
Abdimajid Mohamed Nur, convicted at the first trial, is sentenced to 120 months in prison and ordered to pay $47.9 million in restitution. His juror-bribery sentence is imposed separately.
Abdulkarim Farah, who surveilled Juror 52 and recorded the cash delivery, is the first of the five bribery defendants sentenced. He receives 57 months, the high end of the guidelines range.
Aimee Bock is sentenced to 41 years 8 months and later ordered, in the June 4 judgment, to pay $242,807,755 in restitution. At sentencing the court attributed the full $242 million in losses to her. The same day, federal officials announce charges against 15 defendants for over $90 million in alleged Medicaid and other benefits fraud.
Six days after his Most Wanted listing, Said Abdullahi Ereg surrenders to FBI agents at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. He is charged, not convicted, and presumed innocent.
Bock appeals her conviction and sentence to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Abdikerm Abdelahi Eidleh, a former Feeding Our Future employee charged by indictment in 2022, is taken into custody in Mogadishu, Somalia. He is charged, not convicted, and presumed innocent.
The FBI adds Fahad Mohamed Nur, charged in 2022 and believed to have fled a week after the raids, to its Most Wanted Fraudsters list with a reward of up to $150,000.
Abdirashid Bixi Dool pleads guilty to wire fraud for his role, more than $330,000, in claims for meal sites in Pelican Rapids and Moorhead. The two nonprofits behind those sites were paid nearly $1.1 million in all. The Justice Department release announcing it, as corrected July 24, counts him as the 68th Feeding Our Future defendant convicted. An earlier version of the same release said 70th.
Three weeks after his arrest in Mogadishu, Abdikerm Eidleh is transferred to Minnesota. The US and Somalia have no extradition treaty, and the Justice Department calls it his lawful surrender. The US Attorney calls him "second only to Aimee Bock" in the scheme. He is charged, not convicted, and presumed innocent.
Abdiaziz Farah, already serving 28 years for the fraud, is sentenced to 120 months for bribing Juror 52, for a combined 38 years, per KSTP. Two of the five bribery defendants have been sentenced. As of October 11, 2026 no sentencing had been reported for the other three.
Mohamoud Warsame (spelled Mahamoud in some reporting), owner of Metro Area Catering, pleads guilty to wire fraud about a week after being charged as the 80th Feeding Our Future defendant. The charge involves more than $4.7 million on claims of 1.6 million meals. Press tallies now count 69 convictions.
Abdinasir Mahamed Abshir, a Bock co-defendant who approached a cooperating witness outside the courtroom during the 2025 trial, is sentenced to 78 months. Salim Said, whose sentencing had been set for the same day, is not sentenced. A July 30 docket order had reset his sentencing to October 8, and KSTP later reported it had moved to late October.
Bock’s 72-page Eighth Circuit brief argues the government never proved she knew the scope of the fraud, attacks the bribery theory, and calls the restitution order a payment stream mislabeled as loss. The government’s response was due September 11, 2026. Whether it was filed on time or extended had not been confirmed as of October 11, 2026.
Abdihakim Ali Ahmed (54 months) and Ahmed Abdullahi Ghedi (65 months) of the Gurey Deli site, and bookkeeper Ahmed Sharif Omar-Hashim (36 months), are sentenced August 26 and 27. The Justice Department counts them as the 24th, 25th, and 26th defendants sentenced.
Mekfira Hussein (57 months) and Abduljabar Hussein (40 months) are sentenced for conspiracy to commit wire fraud in a scheme through which they obtained about $8.8 million in child-nutrition funds.
The other large nonprofit sponsor settles the Attorney General’s civil False Claims Act suit. The settlement takes $18,517,909.27, all the money it has, and requires dissolution. In the court filing it denies the allegations (per MPR News). No criminal charge against the organization or its leaders had been reported as of October 11, 2026, and the Attorney General says civil investigations of individuals continue. The money goes back to the Minnesota Department of Education and then to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Abdi Nur Salah, a former aide to the Minneapolis mayor (per KSTP) who pleaded guilty in January 2025, is sentenced to 33 months. The Justice Department counts him as the 31st defendant sentenced in the scheme. He received about $1.66 million, per the release.
An indictment filed September 29 and unsealed October 1 charges Shaakir Mohamud Ibrahim with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and five counts of monetary transactions in criminally derived property. It alleges that from about March 2021 to February 2022 the meal programs named in it claimed over $1.2 million from Feeding Our Future and received about $1.1 million. MPR News counts him as the 81st person indicted in the scheme. He is charged, not convicted, and presumed innocent.
People charged but not convicted are presumed innocent, and amounts labeled alleged come from charging documents, not proven losses. Method and corrections