Arizona: Largest food stamp fraud bust in state’s history

Update September 1:  I just came across this handy information on how to report suspected food stamp fraud in your town!

When I saw the first reports around the country about this case that involved a SWAT team, I had to laugh because those reports all just said “three men with the same last name”—no photo, no name!   Now, I see the story got wider coverage and there was no hesitancy by the likes of the Daily Caller to name names.

The Sweiss family fraudsters! (alleged fraudsters) Every time I see a warm and fuzzy story about immigrant entrepreneurs helping the US economy, these are the kinds of faces I see.

By the way, the perps are a father and two sons with the last name ‘Sweiss’.  I looked around a little and see that they might be Jordanian.  In any case, their passports have been confiscated.

From the Daily Caller:

Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne announced the state’s largest undercover food stamp fraud bust and the arrests of three individuals involved on Thursday.

K & S convenience store employees Kameel Sweiss, 51, Ameer Sweis, 22, Faday Sweiss, 33, were arrested Wednesday for allegedly illegally conducting an enterprise, fraudulent schemes and artifices, money laundering, unlawful use of food stamps and computer tampering.

According to Horne, Wednesday morning SWAT units of the Phoenix Police Department entered the K & S convenience store to execute search warrants and seized $32,876 in cash, a key to a private bank vault holding $550,480 in cash, bank records, accounts, food stamp cards, business ledgers and three vehicles.

[….]

“This business was stealing taxpayer money by allowing a person with a food stamp card to purchase something small, such as a bag of chips, and then overcharge that card to make a fraudulent profit,” Horne explained in a statement.

“This seizure is the largest in our state’s history with regard to food stamp fraud and should serve as a strong warning to those who continue to engage in these kinds of illegal actions,” he added.

For new readers, we follow immigrant food stamp fraud here as a hobby.  I’m still waiting for a would-be blogger to take this on as a full time project.  I promise there are stories daily on immigrant-run ‘mom & pop’ groceries ripping off the US taxpayer.  Type ‘food stamp fraud’ into our search function and you will see dozens and dozens of posts about this type of fraud from coast to coast.  And, by the way, this may be the largest in Arizona so far, but it’s not the largest we have reported from elsewhere in the US.

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