‘I serve drinks’ testifies bartender falsely named as Feeding Our Future board president
Go Deeper.
Create an account or log in to save stories.
Like this?
Thanks for liking this story! We have added it to a list of your favorite stories.
A Twin Cities man once listed as Feeding Our Future's board president testified in federal court on Tuesday that he had no knowledge of the nonprofit and was surprised to see his name on its organizational chart.
Feeding Our Future founder Aimee Bock and Salim Said, a former Minneapolis restaurant owner, are on trial for their alleged roles in a $250 million scam to defraud taxpayer-funded child nutrition programs during the pandemic.
Benjamin Stayberg testified that he met Bock through mutual friends while he was tending bar at a St. Paul steakhouse. Stayberg said that he knew that Bock worked at a nonprofit, but that he did not know anything about the organization.
Stayberg, 42, said it was only later that he learned he was listed as president of the Feeding Our Future board when a newspaper reporter contacted him.
Turn Up Your Support
MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all.
“They called my phone, and I said, ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ and I hung up." Stayberg said.
Stayberg added that he received certified mail from the Minnesota Department of Education, which distributes federal funding for the programs on the state level, but he ignored and discarded the letters. Stayberg said that he began to piece things together when a legal process server appeared at his home with a subpoena from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
“There was a guy looking around my window at night, and I had dogs and we almost got into it,” he said.
Stayberg looked up his name online and saw that he was quoted in a story that the New York Times published soon after the FBI searched Feeding Our Future’s offices, Bock’s home and other locations related to the investigation.
Lead prosecutor Joe Thompson showed Stayberg a Feeding Our Future organizational chart.
“If you look at the top, your name is on it. It lists you as the board president,” Thompson said.
“Yeah, big shoes,” Stayberg replied to muffled chuckles in the courtroom.
When Thompson asked Stayberg how he came to be listed as an officer of Feeding Our Future, Stayberg replied that while he was working at the bar, Bock presented him with a document that appeared to be a petition about feeding children. Stayberg said that he signed, thinking that he was supporting a worthy cause.
Thompson then showed Stayberg copies of board meeting minutes and training documents that he purportedly signed, but Stayberg said that the signature on the papers isn’t his.
Minutes from November 2018 show that Stayberg attended and was interested in becoming board chair because he has “extensive knowledge of food sourcing and food costs.”
“Do you have extensive knowledge of food sourcing and food costs?” Thompson asked.
“No. I serve drinks,” Stayberg replied.
“You don’t know whether Ms. Bock wrote your name and signature?” asked Bock’s defense attorney Ken Udoibok.
“No, I do not,” Stayberg replied.
Cooperating defendant testifies
Jurors also heard testimony on Tuesday from Lul Bashir Ali, who pleaded guilty in 2023 to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.
In 2020, Ali, 59, enrolled her small Faribault restaurant in the federal child nutrition programs under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future after a man associated with the nonprofit urged her to claim Lido as a meal distribution site and said that it was a good opportunity to make money.
Under questioning from Thompson, Ali said that she soon submitted reimbursement requests for 1,000 meals per day at a restaurant where she typically served no more than 50 patrons each day.
“We don’t have enough kitchen [space] we don’t have enough employees” to serve 1,000 daily meals, Ali said.
Ali said that by early 2021, Bock and others at Feeding Our Future convinced her to submit claims for as many as 1,600 meals that were never served to children.
After receiving reimbursement from the Minnesota Department of Education, which disburses the federal funds in the state, Ali said she made monthly payments of $30,000 in cash to Abdikerm Eidleh, a Feeding Our Future employee. Prosecutors have said that Eidleh, who has also been indicted in the case, fled the United States.
In her plea agreement, Ali admitted that the payments to Eidleh were illegal kickbacks. In court, she said that she had difficulty obtaining that much cash on a regular basis because of banking regulations.
Ali’s husband, Mohamed Ali Hussein, also pleaded guilty in 2023. He admitted using his nonprofit, Somali American Faribault Education, to siphon $2.1 million from government coffers by submitting false meal reimbursement requests.
Ali testified that together, she and Hussein stole $5 million, part of which they spent on two houses and a vehicle.
Ali broke down in tears when Thompson asked about the day that FBI agents showed up to question her about the fraud.
“The day they come to me, I never forget that day,” Ali said.
“Did Ms. Bock force you to write those numbers down?” Udoibok asked on cross examination.
“Absolutely not,” Ali replied. But Ali said that Bock, in video calls, encouraged her to fill out fraudulent reimbursement requests.
“‘Do this, [and] you make money,’” Ali recounted Bock telling her.