She was hungry for cash.
A Missouri charity boss swiped practically $11 million meant for food-starved, low-income youngsters and blew it on lavish objects similar to mansions and a flashy yellow Mercedes for her boyfriend, prosecutors mentioned Tuesday.
Connie Bobo, 46, who ran the New Heights Neighborhood Useful resource Middle in Bridgeton, allegedly claimed she had spent $20 million of the federally allotted taxpayer cash to feed the youngsters between February 2019 to March 2022.
However she truly spent lower than half of these “meal reimbursement” funds on meals — as an alternative plunking down large bucks on actual property and “luxurious items,” and giving her romantic accomplice $1.4 million, in line with prosecutors.
“[She bought] a mansion for herself, homes for her household and a brilliant yellow Mercedes for her boyfriend,” Assistant US Lawyer Jonathan Clow informed jurors at her fraud trial Tuesday.
“As her lies have been found, the defendant used cast paperwork to attempt to cowl up her crimes,” he mentioned, in line with stltoday.com
In complete, Bobo purchased seven properties, together with a virtually $1 million mansion for herself in St. Charles, in line with her federal indictment, filed in October 2023.
She spent $2.2 million of cash for this system, funded by the US Division of Agriculture, on a industrial actual property funding, prosecutors mentioned.
Throughout her spending spree, she additionally gave roughly $1.4 million to her boyfriend Howard Hughes III, who spent roughly $212,000 of the funds on a gleaming Mercedes-Benz G550 Wagon 4X4 Squared, in line with the indictment.
To cowl her tracks, Bobo named her relations and mates as New Heights board members on official paperwork with out their information, prosecutors mentioned.
Her buddy, Dacia Betts, testified Tuesday that she was surprised to be taught she was listed because the non-profit’s vice-president after being contacted by FBI.
Bobo’s lawyer, in the meantime, argued that she didn’t imply to violate federal guidelines and tried to appropriate the issues earlier than she was arrested.
“Each step that Ms. Bobo took was for the perfect curiosity of the neighborhood and an try to offer again,” legal professional Katryna Spearman informed jurors in her opening assertion within the fraud trial Tuesday.
Bobo was charged with three counts of wire fraud, aggravated id theft and obstruction for allegedly falsifying meals vendor invoices subpoenaed by a grand jury.
She faces 20 years behind bars.
