A former congressional candidate for Virginia’s 2nd District defrauded a federal food service program that feeds low-income children.
Shaun Brown, 60, of Hampton, was sentenced Wednesday to three years in prison and one year of home detention for conspiracy to commit wire fraud and causing false records, wire fraud, and theft of government funds.
“Brown lied about feeding needy children in our community in hopes of making a financial gain for herself,” said G. Zachary Terwilliger, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia. “We will continue to thoroughly investigate those who lie and steal from taxpayers and the federal government. I want to thank our trial team and investigative partners for their incredible work on this important case.”
According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Brown defrauded the USDA’s summer food service program aimed at feeding low income children.
Federal prosecutors said Brown and her mother ran a non-profit company, JOBS Community Development Corporation, which served as a sponsor for the SFSP.
Over the course of the 2012 Summer, Brown inflated the number of meals JOBS purportedly served to low-income children and submitted fraudulent claims for reimbursement based on the inflated numbers.
Prosecutors said Brown also orchestrated a massive scheme to falsify hundreds of documents to support her fraudulently inflated meal count numbers and ordered excessive amounts of food and milk products which she was well aware would never be used to feed needy children. At her direction, Brown’s employees disposed of this food and milk, purchased with federal funds, in large mounds behind buildings in Newport News, as well as a pig farm in Southern Virginia. As a result of her fraudulent actions, the USDA paid JOBS over $800,000 in federal funds.
Brown ran as the Democratic candidate for the 2nd Congressional District for the U.S. House of Representatives in 2016. She attempted to run again as an independent candidate in the 2018 election, but was removed from the ballot because of other fraudulent actions by Brown and others, federal prosecutors said.
She was indicted on fraud charges in connection with the food service program in December 2017.
The 2nd district includes Accomack and Northampton counties, portions of York County, and the cities of Virginia Beach and Williamsburg and parts of the cities of Norfolk and Hampton.
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