Multiple autism therapy centers have been connected to a $250 million federal fraud case.
A federal child nutrition program enacted by the state of Minnesota was found to have been abused in 2022, with more than $240 million in federal child nutrition program funds being stolen for personal gain.
New reporting by the Minnesota Reformer found that multiple autism therapy centers received substantial funding from the program.
As part of the nutrition program, organizations, including one nonprofit called Feeding Our Future, were tasked with operating food distribution sites throughout the state of Minnesota. Instead, organization leaders fraudulently claimed to be serving meals to thousands of children and laundered the reimbursement money,
In September 2022, the U.S. Department of Justice charged 47 defendants for allegedly taking part in what Andrew Luger, U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota, called “a brazen scheme of staggering proportions.”
“These defendants exploited a program designed to provide nutritious food to needy children during the COVID-19 pandemic,” Luger said in a statement. “Instead, they prioritized their own greed, stealing more than a quarter of a billion dollars in federal funds to purchase luxury cars, houses, jewelry and coastal resort property abroad.”
Some of the cases’ defendants have now been found to have connections with autism centers that received hundreds of thousands of dollars through the nutrition program.
One defendant, 40-year-old Bekam Addissu Merdassa of Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota, pleaded guilty to using a non-profit entity called Youth Inventors Lab as a shell company to misappropriate millions of dollars that were intended to pay for meals for underprivileged children.
Merdassa is also the owner of a St. Paul, Minnesota-based company called Epic Therapy, according to FBI investigation documents, which the Minnesota Reformer identified as an autism therapy clinic. Epic Therapy participated in the child nutrition program, was authorized to distribute free food to up to 5,500 children per day, and was reimbursed more than $945,000 in 2021.
At least two other autism therapy clinics also received significant funding from the federal nutrition program.
Other autism centers sought to participate in the program, according to the Minnesota Reformer, but never received payments.
The Minnesota Reformer previously linked several other defendants associated with the Feeding Our Future case to Minnesota autism therapy centers.
