Woman gets three years in prison for role creating bogus documents in Feeding Our Future fraud plot

A woman found guilty during the first trial in the massive Feeding Our Future fraud scheme was sentenced Tuesday to more than three years in prison for her role in fleecing the federal government out of millions of dollars meant to feed needy children during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hayat Mohamed Nur, one of seven defendants put on trial last year, was found guilty of three wire fraud counts in the sprawling multimillion dollar fraud case centered around the nonprofit Feeding Our Future. Her sentence also called for $47 million in restitution.

Hayat Nur’s false meal counts and invoices served as the “backbone” of her participation in the fraud plot, prosecutors described in court filings. She created false documentation claiming she and her co-conspirators operated 20 food-distribution sites across Minnesota that served hundreds, sometimes thousands, of meals to children on a daily basis. A single invoice created by the group in January 2022 requested $2.2 million in reimbursements.

Prosecutors said Nur was recruited by her brother and co-defendant, Abdimajid Mohamed Nur, who trained her on how to create the bogus documents. Jurors convicted Abdimajid Mohamed Nur of an assortment of money laundering and wire fraud charges at the same trial. He also later pleaded guilty to trying to evade that conviction by participating in a plot to bribe one of the jurors overseeing his trial with $120,000 in cash. All five defendants involved in the bribe attempt have since pleaded guilty.

The massive Feeding Our Future case has seen 73 people charged in the scheme. The latest defendant hit with charges also pleaded guilty Tuesday to one count of wire fraud.

Hussein Mohamed Farah, the executive director of St. Paul nonprofit New Vision Foundation, was charged earlier this month in connection with the fraud investigation. Prosecutors accused him of falsely claiming to serve meals at two distribution sites operated by New Vision Foundation, under Feeding Our Future’s sponsorship. From February 2021 through January 2022, the foundation received $2.7 million in reimbursements.