Minnesota Man Involved in Food Aid Fraud Scheme Sentenced to 43 Months

A Minneapolis man who bought a house with federal funds that were supposed to be used for feeding children during the COVID-19 pandemic has been sentenced to 43 months in prison followed by two years of supervised release.

Abdullahe Nur Jesow was ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $866,458 for being part of Feeding Our Future’s $250 million fraud scheme that exploited funds from a Federal Child Nutrition Program meal distribution site during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The sentence handed down today should be a clear message to those who would seek to enrich themselves by defrauding critical child nutrition programs,” FBI Minneapolis Division Special Agent in Charge Christopher D. Dotson said in a news release on April 9.

Jesow used his Minneapolis-based event space, Benadir Hall, to operate a Federal Child Nutrition Program meal distribution site with the nonprofit Feeding Our Future from December 2020 through September 2021. The program teamed up with the Academy for Youth Excellence, a nonprofit that involved Jesow.

The Academy for Youth Excellence received $4,286,088 in Federal Child Nutrition Program funds and claimed that it served more than 1.7 million meals to children from Jesow’s Benadir Hall, but those numbers were heavily fabricated.

Instead of feeding kids, the 65-year-old venue owner misappropriated the funds to buy a home in Columbia Heights, Minnesota.

“The FBI and our investigative partners have and will continue to direct significant investigative resources to rooting out fraud in the programs that support and sustain our children and our communities,” Dotson said.

During sentencing, U.S. District Court by Judge Nancy E. Brasel said Jesow’s fraud “severely undermined public trust in government programs and in the government itself.”

Jesow was one of eight defendants charged in a 23-count indictment in September 2022. He initially was charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and money laundering.

Jesow pleaded guilty to one count of money laundering in September 2025.

The mastermind behind the fraud, Feeding Our Future’s founder and executive director Aimee Bock, was convicted in March 2025 on four counts of wire fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, one count of bribery, and one count of conspiracy to commit federal programs bribery.

Gov. Tim Walz (D-Minn.) said that his administration acted quickly when officials were notified about the fraud, according to testimony before Congress on March 4.

During the hearing on Capitol Hill, Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) said state employees “kept payments flowing” after they discovered the fraud.