ST. LOUIS — Federal prosecutors filed charges against the former head of a ºüÀêÊÓƵ nonprofit that received about $20 million from the government to feed needy children but spent much of that money illegally on personal residences, commercial real estate and luxury goods, including an SUV valued at more than $200,000.
An indictment unsealed Thursday charged Connie Bobo, of St. Charles, with wire fraud and identify theft in connection to her use of federal money when she led New Heights Community Resource Center. It also charged her with obstruction of an official proceeding for altering a document sought by a federal subpoena.
New Heights was among organizations featured in a Post-Dispatch investigation of Missouri nonprofits’ use of two federal programs, the Child and Adult Care Food Program and Summer Food Service Program, that pay for needy kids’ meals.
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The Post-Dispatch reported in November that Bobo’s nonprofit had purchased a new home on Spring Mill Creek Drive in St. Charles for nearly $1 million. Bobo admitted that she lived there but said New Heights used it for its office and board meetings.
Bobo also used the money to purchase a vacant Circuit City store — appraised at nearly $2 million — at Natural Bridge Road near Interstate 270 in Bridgeton, the Post-Dispatch reported. She said she had hoped to turn the building into a headquarters for New Heights.
The indictment unsealed Thursday paints a fuller picture, saying Bobo fraudulently claimed millions of additional meals that she didn’t serve and was paid $11 million she wasn’t entitled to receive.
Bobo’s attorney, Scott Rosenblum, said Thursday that “we have been in communication with the government, and we were expecting†the indictment. Bobo will plead not guilty, he said.
According to the indictment, New Heights used food program money to buy five residences in St. Charles County, including Bobo’s house and a home in St. Peters for her sister. The real estate purchases, including the commercial properties on Natural Bridge, totaled nearly $4.4 million, prosecutors say.
Bobo also took government money to buy luxury goods and gave $1.4 million to her romantic partner, prosecutors say, who used $212,000 of it to buy . Her partner is identified only as “H.H.†in the indictment. Prosecutors are seeking forfeiture of the property Bobo used the child nutrition money to purchase.
Public records show Bobo and Howard Hughes III started a business together, Howard Hughes Trucking and Construction LLC. Both are listed as co-organizers on business license paperwork and the company’s listed address was the same as Bobo’s Spring Mill Creek home.
Hughes also runs Howard Hughes Consulting, which offers financial wealth management services and construction and development services on its website. The website also has .
Hughes did not respond Thursday to a phone call, a text and an email.
Bobo told the newspaper last year that she also distributed millions of meals to people in need during an uncertain time.
“Nobody’s money went to waste,†she said last year. “We purchased the food, we served the people and those numbers are not doctored. Those are real numbers.â€
Federal prosecutors, however, said she was doctoring records even before the pandemic. She claimed an associate served as president of her nonprofit, when the person did not. Her use of people’s names she falsely claimed served as New Heights board members led to the identity theft charges.
During the pandemic, prosecutors say Bobo submitted false reimbursement claims for meals New Heights never actually served. She claimed the nonprofit served six million meals to children when in fact it had purchased only enough food to serve less than half that number. Prosecutors say the fraudulent claims netted Bobo $11 million in USDA food reimbursement she was not entitled to.
And as federal authorities were investigating, Bobo in July forged an invoice for the purchase of hundreds of gallons of milk that she never bought. That led prosecutors to charge her with obstruction of an official proceeding in addition to the wire fraud and identity theft.
“This indictment shows that we will aggressively pursue those who defraud a program intended to feed needy children, and those who exploited loopholes created by a global pandemic,†U.S. Attorney Sayler A. Fleming said in a statement. “We will seize the houses and luxury vehicles that they buy with those funds and we will seek punishment that is appropriate for the scale of the crime, which by law includes repayment of the funds.â€
The wire fraud and obstruction charges carry a penalty of up to 20 years in prison. The identity theft charges are punishable by up to an additional two years in prison.
The FBI and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Office of Inspector General investigated the case, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Derek Wiseman is handling the case for the Eastern District of Missouri.
Loosened rules
During the pandemic, the rules governing the two U.S. Department of Agriculture programs were loosened, allowing organizations to distribute a week’s worth of meals at a time in drive-thru style events, with each meal worth as much as $4.56 in federal reimbursement. The setup rewarded scale, becoming lucrative enough for larger nonprofits that could finance bulk orders of food that they were shipping meals far outside their own cities. New Heights and other local groups were trucking food from ºüÀêÊÓƵ for distribution at sites as far away as Kansas City and Poplar Bluff.
Regulators at the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, who administered the program, became so concerned with the ballooning claims numbers that they ended the waivers allowing grab-and-go meals, requiring beneficiaries to eat on site as the program had required pre-pandemic. The move prompted as the only state not to renew the waivers, drawing criticism from state Democrats who sharply criticized Gov. Mike Parson’s administration.
But state health department officials defended their decision, citing the enormous claims figures and “red flags†such as reimbursement paperwork with illegible attendance numbers and meal counts or repeated recipient names.
The food program has sparked other major federal fraud charges. Last year, federal prosecutors in Minneapolis charged nearly 50 people there in connection with a massive, $250 million fraud involving the food programs that authorities said at the time was the largest fraud to date tied to emergency pandemic spending.
Bobo’s New Heights started out small when she founded it in 2011. Bobo said she struggled at first, putting her modest salary back into the organization and maxing out credit cards to buy food to serve needy kids. By 2019, she had grown relatively large among the hundreds of Missouri nonprofits that participated in the child nutrition programs, claiming $260,000 in food reimbursement and paying herself $60,000 as executive director.
But when COVID-19 hit in 2020, and the rules were changed so children no longer had to eat in congregate settings to limit the spread of the virus, the reimbursement sums grew astronomically. By May 2020, Bobo’s organization had claimed $350,000 in a single month. That year, she grew to one of the largest program participants, claiming $5 million in USDA meal reimbursement. In 2021, New Heights claimed the largest sum in Missouri’s summer food distribution program — $11 million.
In all, she billed about $20 million to the programs while they operated under loosened pandemic rules, according to state records.
The state flagged millions of dollars in claims the organization submitted, blocking millions more that would have been paid out to New Heights. Missouri regulators last year placed Bobo, New Heights and the nonprofit’s president, Anita Carter-Foley, on a USDA blacklist that bars participation in the program for up to seven years. Carter-Foley said, and the indictment confirmed, she was never actually involved with the nonprofit.
Other organizations
Bobo and New Heights were not the only Missouri organizations with issues, according to state regulators.
Federal authorities also subpoenaed records related to Influence Church, whose pastor, Darnell West, used a helicopter to fly between his churches. His wife and co-pastor, Rochelle West, is an accountant who managed financial records for the church’s participation in the program.
The largest participant in the program was Springfield-based Life360 Community Services, tied to a church of the same name that billed over $43 million to the programs. State regulators flagged high salaries paid to church leader Ted Cederblom and his family members on the payroll.
Fleming, the U.S. Attorney, said anyone information about COVID-19 related fraud should contact the at 866-720-5721.