….pleads guilty in Oklahoma.
Ho hum, here we go again. Only a couple of days ago I told you about other Muslim food stamp fraudsters here.
From the Edmond Sun:
EDMOND — A 28-year-old Edmond man pleaded guilty Monday to defrauding the food stamp program out of $652,614 in benefits, a federal attorney announced.
Sanford C. Coats, United States attorney for the Western District of Oklahoma, said Muhammad Zahid, 28, of Edmond, pleaded guilty to count 4 of the indictment and admitted that he unlawfully redeemed a beneficiary’s food stamp benefits for cash.
At sentencing, Zahid faces up to five years in prison, a $10,000 fine or possible alternative fine of $250,000, and restitution. Sentencing will take place in about 90 days, according to Coats.
[…..]
Zahid applied and was authorized by USDA on Oct. 15, 2007, to be a qualified retail store to accept SNAP benefits. The indictment alleged that he conspired with others to purchase SNAP benefits for cash on a discount basis of .50 cents on the dollar and would then debit SNAP recipients’ Access Oklahoma cards for the full dollar benefit.
It is alleged that from December 2007 through September 2010, Zahid illegally redeemed $652,614 in SNAP benefits from the USDA, according to court records.
So, Muhammad stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from the taxpayer and might be ordered to pay restitution. You know that old expression—you can’t get blood out of a stone—yup, you got it.
This reminds me of the article I posted on in 2008 about an Arab publication scratching its head (editorially) over why so many Arab names appeared in food stamp fraud crime stories. You really need to go have a good laugh here. What do they all have in common—well, you see, it’s kind of like biker gangs!