Abdul Abubakar Ali sentenced to ONE year for $3 MILLION part in Minnesota Feeding Our Future fraud scheme

Abdul Abubakar Ali apologized in the Monday sentencing hearing, telling the judge, "Your honor, I just want to say I’m sorry to everyone that my actions have hurt. This was a mistake. I will try to correct it for the rest of my life. It’s not something that’s in the past. I’ve let down a lot of people. I promise I will attempt to fix it for the rest of my life. So, I’m sorry."

Ali had pleaded guilty in October of 2022 to using a non-profit called Youth Inventors Lab as a shell company to exploit federal child nutrition funds during the pandemic. The non-profit enrolled in the Federal Child Nutrition program under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future, and claimed to have served over 1.3 million meals to children between December 2020 and June 2021. The non-profit submitted fake invoices claiming to have purchased food from a vendor, S&S Catering. The Department of Justice said at the time, "But S & S Catering did not provide Youth Inventors Lab any meals and Youth Inventors Lab did not serve any meals." In total, Youth Inventors Lab fraudulently received over $3 million in reimbursements from Feeding Our Future.

Ali submitted fake invoices from Bilterms Solutions, his company, to Youth Inventors Labs, claiming to have provided technology services that were not actually performed. He personally pocketed more than $100,000.

Ali was sentenced to one year and one day in prison by Judge Nancy Brasel, allowing him the opportunity to transition to a halfway house if he exhibits good behavior. The judge, Ali’s defense, and DOJ prosecutors agreed that Ali showed genuine remorse. Ali was one of the first defendants in the wide-spreading Feeding Our Future case, with Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Murphy saying Ali’s cooperation in 2022 led to other guilty pleas and helped the government build its case, per KARE 11.

Judge Brasel denied Ali’s request for probation, saying that he deserved prison time due to aggravating factors that included recruiting a friend for the scheme, and making claims about meals served that were "completely made up."

Brasel said, "This is part of a very large fraud scheme, the largest in the District of Minnesota and one of the largest ever in the country. And you stand responsible for that, and for that reason, I just can’t see, despite your cooperation, a non-custodial sentence here. Let me also add, aggravating factors of not just the money, but the fact that the public trust in government programs has been so substantially undermined and continues to be so. We are still having a conversation in this state about the structure of government programs, given the fraud you participated in, and the impact and ripples of that scheme just keep going on and on and on, and you are one reason for it."

Murphy told the judge during the hearing, "I would say that Mr. Ali’s conduct is an aberration from an otherwise law-abiding life. His life is rather remarkable… he attended Mankato State with a bachelor’s degree in engineering, a master’s in electrical engineering from Purdue, he worked as an engineer for a period of time before returning to Minnesota and making, unfortunately, a very, very poor decision, entering into the space of social welfare programs. Mr. Ali did immediately accept responsibility, within weeks of being indicted, accepted responsibility and wholly admitted his guilt and provided very valuable and useful information to the government at a very early stage."

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