Posted on 03/01/2010 11:19:34 AM PST by Zakeet
Two undercover informants entered Jefferson's Liquor Palace and spotted the owner at the register. "Big baby," said one, "we gon' do this?"
The man behind the counter provided $50 in cash, two bottles of liquor, two porn DVDs and two Viagra pills — all in exchange for taking $280.85 off a food-stamp card, say federal investigators who recorded the deal.
Fraud in the government program that helps the poor has added up to nearly $100 million since 2007, according to the U.S. Agriculture Department. It's a fraction of the more than $40 billion spent to feed people each year, but the crime has become a brazen way for some small stores to literally swipe cash from the U.S. Treasury, especially in the Detroit area.
There have been at least 122 fraud-related convictions of owners or employees in the five-state Midwest region since 2007, nearly double the number from 2004-06, says USDA, which oversees the welfare program. About half of those have occurred in southeastern Michigan.
Among the latest cases: A store west of downtown Detroit is accused of selling bags of the exotic chewy drug khat in exchange for food-stamp benefits. Agents in another investigation discovered that cash was wired to Somalia and other countries.
"You have a money machine on your counter. It's a crime of opportunity. We see a lot of cases," said Sheldon Light, head of the economic-crimes unit at the U.S. attorney's office in Detroit.
(Excerpt) Read more at mlive.com ...
People wouldn't abuse their entitlement if you lazy taxpayers would give them more money in the first place.
Cities will get livable again when the money is cut off and the current residents eat each other.
Lets reduce the deficit by giving food stamps to people who make 20% less than is required now. Then cut the benefits by at least 10%.
Of course in a year or two we may have no choice but to make some drastic cuts.
Liquor, prOn, Viagra. Terrific. :-/
Food stamps paying for more welfare babies.
Nation wide? If so, that is an hellacious under statement.
But, with a corrupt store owner ... he can ring you up as buying food - while simply letting you pick up anything you like.
Like this article, the person really got booze, porn, Viagra and the store owner rang up $50 worth of merchanidice for $200+ in ‘food stamp’ money.
Remember the good ol’days when Food stamps really were stamps. The person paying for their food had the stigma of paying with coupons for food, instead of simply swiping a card. That went away because it made the recipients of the Food Stamps ‘feel bad’.
Good times.
More Michigan muslim fraud like another muslim fraud we know.
That's how grandpa spends his friday nights...
How is a liquor store able to debit an electronic welfare card?
I was behind a couple at the dollar store. They put two Sprites on the welfare card, then bought $15 in dollar crap and got $50 in cash from a Debit card. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Debit card wasn’t their card as well.
Whoever gets that bill will be surprised “$65 from the dollar store????”.
It probably sells soda as well.
Detroit - Nuke the site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.
Yep -
1. Stop feeding the raccoons.
2. Starve the monkeys
Rebuild the Republic with the survivors.
And you had to buy them, at least pay some up front for what you got in food stamps.
Shocked, I say. I'm shocked.
Laissez le bon temps roulliez! Cue the zydeco music...
Cut the food stamp program. Period. Other option, force the business that take food stamps to keep a copy listing purchases and must be attached to the receipt of purchase. Inform business that audits will be made on a random plan. Most cash registers provide a receipt.
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