Arkansas woman pleads guilty in feeding program scheme that netted $575,000

A former security officer at Little Rock’s federal administration building has pleaded guilty to a wire-fraud charge related to a scheme that allowed her to steal nearly $600,000 from a federal feeding program.

Maria Carmen Nelson, 50 was indicted by a federal grand jury in October on one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and 20 additional counts of wire fraud, said U.S. Attorney Christopher Thyer in a news release.

Nelson on Thursday appeared before U.S. District Judge J. Leon Holmes in Little Rock, where she pleaded guilty to the conspiracy charge. Sentencing is set for a later, unannounced date.

The maximum penalty for the count is 20 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release.

An indictment accused Nelson of obtaining $575,917.76 in federal funds between March 2012 and March 2015 as an administrator for an organization called Securing Our Future. She and a state Department of Human Services employee were beneficiaries of the scheme, Thyer said.

That employee, whose identity was not included in information from the U.S. attorney's office, no longer works for the department.

Nelson claimed that she had fed hundreds of children, but prosecutors said no more than 20 children were seen at three locations she operated.

Read Friday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.

Information for this article was contributed by Linda Satter of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

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