Posted on 05/08/2013 4:00:50 AM PDT by markomalley
A Riverdale man pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court in Atlanta to a $400,000 food stamp scheme.
Herbert Dix, 49, admitted to defrauding the U.S. Department of Agriculture and possessing forged Women, Infant and Children (WIC) vouchers while running a store in Griffin, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
“Many people rely on government assistance to feed their families and children,” U.S. Attorney Sally Quillian Yates said in the news release. “This conviction demonstrates our commitment to prosecute those who defraud the USDA of funds meant for the neediest families.”
Dix was indicted last July on 18 counts of WIC fraud and 83 counts of possession of forged securities. He pleaded guilty to every charge, authorities said.
Dix owned and operated Spank’s Quick Stop in Griffin, and the store was authorized to redeem WIC vouchers for specified food items. Dix and his employees broke the law by paying cash for the WIC vouchers instead of taking them as payment for the food items listed on the vouchers, prosecutors said.
(Excerpt) Read more at ajc.com ...
“Food stamp fraud.” Ahh, but I repeat myself.
And this is just one man, one location
“When a search warrant was executed in December 2010, more than 100 blank WIC vouchers were seized. Authorities later determined by analyzing Dix’s bank records that more than $400,000 had been fraudulently obtained from the USDA between 2010 and 2011.”
Just the tip of the iceberg folks. i imagine there are thousands of people defruding the US in this way. The only reason this guy got caught is because he’s dumber than most.
At least it was a home grown America who made out good on food stamp fraud (until arrested) instead of an imported Muhammad or Gonzalez
If they locked up everyone who committed food stamp fraud, president hussein would be behind bars.
As usual, they just go for the Little People.
Can't seem to find a mug shot.
So why isn’t the government charging the people who sold their vouchers with fraud?
Or at least cutting off their food stamps?
Just the dopes stupid enough to get caught. And 400K is probably chump change compared to the fraud the slightly smarter ones get away with.
Been going on a long time. Back in the '90s my wife was a teller in a Georgia bank and noticed one store owner bringing in wads of stamps in straight numerical order - as if the had been ripped wholesale from the book. (Some people told us they were being sold at 50c on the dollar.)
She contacted the manager, who notified the authorities. A month later the guy was still doing the same thing, with different tellers. The manager notified the authorities again and was told the guy was "under surveillance".
We left five years later and he evidently was still "under surveillance" as he was still cashing in the stamps - in numerical order.
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