Feeding Our Future attempted bribery case could affect other trials in Minnesota

The alleged attempted bribery of a juror this month in the Feeding Our Future trial could complicate the federal court’s ability to find jurors for upcoming trials in the sprawling fraud case, prompting prosecutors to raise the prospects for anonymous or sequestered juries.

Legal experts say that news about the surveillance and a $120,000 attempted bribe of a juror, who immediately reported it to police, could deter prospective jurors from wanting to serve in the trials of the more than 40 people who still face federal charges. The five convicted this month were the first to face trial among the 70 people charged since 2022, accused of stealing money from programs meant to feed low-income kids during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In announcing charges against five people in the bribery case Wednesday, including three of the men who were on trial this month, U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger said his office will seek more anonymous juries and sequester juries in some cases.

“This form of corruption has now made its way to Minnesota,” Luger said, comparing the state’s first federal juror bribery case in generations to what he saw while prosecuting organized crime at the start of his career in New York. “We must therefore take this threat to our system of justice seriously going forward.”

Luger said this week that his office will work with the FBI and other law enforcement partners to “examine when and whether to seek anonymous and sequestered juries to protect from what happened here.”

Senior Judge Kevin Burke, a former chief judge in Hennepin County, said widespread publicity about the attempted bribe and case could make it harder to find jurors for the other fraud trials — although, he added, fewer people pay attention to local news and may still be unaware of the Feeding Our Future case, which has been in the news since January 2022.

It took four days of jury selection in this month’s trial to find jurors from across the state who weren’t connected with the case or didn’t have strong opinions about it.

Burke said anonymous juries, where jurors’ names aren’t revealed even to attorneys in the case, are rarely used in the United States and were never used in his career as a judge and attorney. He said attorneys will need to prove that it’s necessary and balance the need for public transparency.

He pointed to the Russian closed-door trial of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich. “We don’t want to emulate that,” he said. “You end up losing the transparency that is very important for the justice system to operate.”

There are also instances when anonymous juries backfire, leaving attorneys without important details about jurors’ personal lives that might raise bias concerns, Burke said. Jury sequestration is rarely used because of the inconvenience and expense of putting jurors in hotels, possibly for weeks.

In this month’s Feeding Our Future trial, U.S. District Judge Nancy Brasel sequestered jurors the day after the alleged attempted bribery, citing their safety. They were not allowed to leave the courthouse for meals and stayed in a hotel for four nights before they reached a verdict. The trial had stretched into a seventh week by the time jurors started deliberating.

“Seven weeks in a Motel 6? You would get pushback from jurors,” Burke said.

Because juror bribery is so rare in the U.S., he added, he doesn’t think it will change jury procedures dramatically.

“I caution people to think there is a simple solution to a relatively rare problem,” Burke said.

David Lillehaug, former U.S. Attorney and a former Minnesota Supreme Court justice, cautioned that pursuing anonymous juries could deprive both prosecutors and defense attorneys of the ability to fully vet prospective jurors during jury selection.

In recent history, attempted jury bribes have been notable. There was the John Gotti case in New York in the 1980s and ′90s, where a juror was paid to acquit the mob boss — which had an anonymous jury. In Minnesota, the last known case was when notorious Minneapolis mobster Kid Cann was convicted in 1961 of trying to bribe a juror.

Chief Federal Defender Katherian Roe said that while she understood Luger’s response, “we should not lose sight of the fact that in the history of this district this has happened one time.”

“We should not overreact and change the criminal justice system as we know it because of an allegation that there was attempted jury tampering in one case,” Roe said.

Courts have prosecuted violent gang members for decades without any risk to jurors, Burke said. He added that a bigger barrier for finding jurors to serve is the low pay: $20 a day for state cases and $50 a day for federal.

Ramsey County Chief Judge Leonardo Castro said state district courts have sought state funding to increase the per diem for jurors, which could also help diversify juries.

Of the 70 people charged so far in the meal fraud case, 18 have pleaded guilty, one has died and one has fled the country. This month’s trial involved seven people, five of whom were convicted and two acquitted.

Prosecutors said this week that the co-conspirators of the alleged attempted bribery targeted the youngest juror, who also appeared to be the only person of color. They recruited a 31-year-old Seattle woman, Ladan Mohamed Ali, to fly in and offer the bribe on June 2, the night before final closing arguments.

The juror, who was excused from jury duty, was known only by a number, 52, in the trial. Only defendants and attorneys briefly had access to jurors’ names during jury selection.

Ali, who pleaded not guilty Thursday, was offered $150,000 for delivering the bribe, according to charges. She surveilled the 23-year-old juror’s home in Spring Lake Park 19 times in the day and night, and followed her when she left the downtown Minneapolis federal courthouse.

Abdiaziz Shafii Farah, 35, of Savage, and his brothers, Said Shafii Farah, 42, of Minneapolis and Abdulkarim Shafii Farah, 24, of Minneapolis were charged in the bribery scheme, along with 23-year-old Abdimajid Mohamed Nur of Shakopee.

Abdiaziz Farah and Nur were convicted in the meal fraud trial, while Said Farah was acquitted and released from jail before being booked again after the bribery charges. Said Farah provided the money for the bribe, prosecutors said, not disclosing where the money came from. The defendants’ bank accounts and assets were seized in 2022, part of about $66 million that authorities have seized in the case so far.

According to charges, FBI agents searched Abdiaziz Farah’s home after the bribery attempt and found a list of jurors’ names in a water bottle. Investigators said defendants researched the juror’s address and social media.

Abdulkarim Farah and Ali removed her rental car license plates, presumably to avoid detection, Luger said, when they delivered the bag of cash to the juror. Luger said Ali bought a GPS tracker to put on the juror’s car, but instead flew back to Seattle early when the news broke about the incident. Abdulkarim Farah shot a video of the bribe drop-off, shared with other defendants, according to charges.

They could face from five to 20 years in prison for each crime in the alleged attempted bribery if convicted.

“They studied her, followed her and determined that she would succumb to their scheme,” Luger said. “Fortunately for all of us, juror 52 could not be bought.”