Monday August 25, 2025
Defendant Said Farah, center, enters the federal courthouse in Minneapolis with his attorneys on May 8, 2024, during the Feeding Our Future fraud trial. Farah later pleaded guilty in August 2025 to his role in a juror bribery scheme. Credit: Aaron Nesheim | Sahan Journal
Minneapolis, MINNESOTA (HOL) — The last defendant charged in a brazen scheme to bribe a juror during the high-profile Feeding Our Future fraud trial has pleaded guilty, closing one of Minnesota’s most extraordinary courtroom scandals.
Said Farah, 43, of Minneapolis, admitted Thursday that he helped raise $200,000 in cash intended to sway “Juror 52” during deliberations in June 2024. Prosecutors said he and others gathered the money from multiple sources, including through a hawala near Minneapolis’ Karmel Mall, with the help of an unnamed Feeding Our Future employee who has not been charged in the bribery plot but faces fraud charges in the wider case.
Farah, acquitted last year of fraud charges in the original trial, pleaded guilty to one count of bribery of a juror. Prosecutors have recommended a sentence of five to six and a half years. U.S. District Judge David Doty, who took over because Judge Nancy Brasel presided over the original trial, will determine sentencing later.
Court documents show the bribery conspiracy began in May 2024, when Farah’s brothers, Abdiaziz and Abdulkarim, along with co-defendant Abdimajid Nur, identified Juror 52 as their target. They believed she was the youngest panelist and the only juror of color, and therefore more likely to be swayed. Surveillance included tracking her movements, scouring her social media, and even purchasing a GPS tracker for her car.
Nur recruited Seattle resident Ladan Ali, who flew to Minneapolis after agreeing to deliver the bribe in exchange for $150,000. On May 31, Ali attempted to follow the juror home after court but failed to make contact. The next day, she falsely told Nur she had met the juror at a bar and that the juror wanted $500,000 for an acquittal, a fabrication that accelerated the scheme.
By June 2, Said and Abdiaziz Farah had collected the money and met Nur outside Said’s business, Bushra Wholesalers. They handed him a cardboard box with $200,000 in cash. Later that day, Nur transferred the money to Ali in a Bloomington parking lot, where she placed it into a Hallmark gift bag. Ali and Abdulkarim then went to the juror’s home. Ali delivered $120,000 to a relative of the juror but kept $80,000 for herself.
The juror, a 23-year-old woman, called 911 when she learned of the delivery. Judge Brasel dismissed her from the case, remarking in court that “this juror was terrified,” and immediately sequestered the remaining jurors.
The following morning, prosecutors revealed the bribery attempt in open court, halting proceedings and shocking observers. FBI agents seized the defendants’ phones. Court records say Abdulkarim later deleted an encrypted messaging app to cover his tracks, while Said deleted a video he had received showing the bribe delivery.
Despite the plot, the jury went on to convict five defendants and acquit two, including Said Farah. But within weeks, prosecutors indicted him,
his brothers,
Nur, and Ali in the bribery case. All five have now pleaded guilty and await sentencing.
“This was corruption stacked on corruption,” Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph Thompson said in a statement. “The Feeding Our Future fraud was already staggering. But then came something even more corrosive: a cynical attempt to buy off a juror. It was an unprecedented attack on our system of justice.”
The bribery attempt was tied to the Feeding Our Future scandal, one of the nation’s largest pandemic-era fraud cases. Federal prosecutors have charged 73 people with stealing between $300 million and $400 million meant to feed children during COVID-19. At trial, prosecutors showed how food sites inflated meal counts or claimed to serve thousands of children they never fed.
As of August 2025, 52 defendants have been convicted or pleaded guilty. On Aug. 6, Judge Brasel
sentenced Abdiaziz Farah to 28 years in prison for his central role in the fraud scheme. He still faces additional sentencing in the bribery case.
The investigation was led by the FBI with assistance from IRS Criminal Investigations, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension.