ATLANTA
A federal judge sentenced a man to four years and three months in prison for using his Decatur, Georgia, convenience store to run an illegal food stamp scheme, officials said.
Tessema Lulseged allowed his customers to exchange their food stamp benefits for cash in a scheme that netted him $6.5 million.
The judge ordered Lulseged to pay restitution in the amount of $5.9 million. Lulseged was convicted on these charges on July 7, 2015, after he pleaded guilty, according to authorities.
“The purpose of the food stamp program is to offer low-income citizens nutritional assistance, and this defendant undermined the program solely for his own profit and cost taxpayers more than $6.5 million,” said U.S. Attorney John Horn.
Annually, officials said this type of fraudulent activity undermines this program by misdirecting millions of dollars of taxpayer funds from the purposes they were intended.
“This case represents an individual systematically exploiting those in need and diverting U.S. funds intended for the needy to his own bank account. The FBI is pleased with its role in bringing this case forward for prosecution which resulted in today’s federal prison sentence for Mr. Lulseged,” said J. Britt Johnson, Special Agent in Charge, FBI Atlanta Field Office.
According to Horn, from January 2009 through April 2014, Lulseged operated Tess Market, Inc., d/b/a Big T Supermarket, a convenience store in Decatur, Georgia.
There, he unlawfully allowed his customers to exchange their food stamp benefits for cash at the rate of 60 cents on the dollar, officials said.
As part of the deal, Lulseged required customers to purchase eligible food products equal to 10% of the value of the transaction.
For example, if a customer wanted to sell $100 worth of food stamp benefits for $60, that customer also had to purchase $10 worth of eligible food products from Lulseged’s store.
In executing search and seizure warrants in 2014, the government seized and forfeited over $700,000 in funds tainted by the fraud.