The JigJiga is up for Ahmed Yasin Ali, age 60, who pled guilty this afternoon (Friday) at the Federal Courthouse in downtown Minneapolis.
Ali is Defendant No. 37 (out of 73) in the sprawling free-food scandal. He entered guilty plea No. 46, to become the 53rd person convicted in relation to the fraud case, so far, including seven who were convicted in courtroom trials.
In a twist, Ali pled guilty to one felony count of a new charge, filed just today, related to evading currency reporting requirements back in February 2021. The new charge does not appear to have a direct connection to the free-food scheme under which he was originally charged back in September 2022.
Nonetheless, today’s charge against Ali was filed under the same docket number as the Feeding Our Future fraud case.
The lead defendant of the three-man JigJiga group, Liban Yasin Alishire, entered the case’s 6th guilty plea, overall, way back in January 2023. In the more than 2 1/2 years since, Alishire has yet to be sentenced in the case.
JigJiga is the name of a business center and event space on Lake St. in south Minneapolis where this corner of the fraud was based. JigJiga is named after the capital city of the Somali region of Ethiopia.
According to the indictment in the case (Sept. 2022), Ali was a co-owner of Lake Street Kitchen, the alleged food supplier to the group’s free-food distribution operation. The group claimed to operate food sites at the JigJiga center.
The group is alleged to have taken $1.6 million out of the free-food program, feeding some 3,000 children per day,
The third member of the group, Khadar Jigre Adan, is still scheduled to stand trial beginning September 18.
On Tuesday, August 26, just the 6th sentencing is scheduled to take place in the case. Hayat Nur–a participant in the Empire Cuisine group, defendant No. 22 and coincidentally, conviction No. 22–was convicted on 3 of 5 counts she faced in last year’s courtroom trial.
Also on Tuesday, the latest defendant (No. 73), Hussein Farah of the New Vision Foundation, is scheduled to enter a guilty plea and become conviction No. 54.
