Louisville Man Sentenced To 36 Months For Defrauding The Federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Of $789,657.06

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – A Louisville man was recently sentenced in United States District Court by Senior Judge Charles R. Simpson III to serve 36 months in prison, for defrauding the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) of $789,657.06, announced United States Attorney John E. Kuhn, Jr.

Andrew Saas, 40, was charged in a single count criminal information and pleaded guilty to defrauding SNAP, also known as the Food Stamp Program, on April 21, 2017. He was sentenced on August 24, 2017, to serve 36 months in prison followed by a three-year period of supervised release and ordered to pay $789,657.06 restitution to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).

According to the plea agreement, SNAP is administered by the USDA to provide food-purchasing assistance to low-income individuals through the issue of electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards to recipients. Saas defrauded SNAP by providing SNAP EBT cardholders with cash in exchange for SNAP benefits, in violation of SNAP policies and regulations. SNAP benefits may only be redeemed for eligible food items. Saas provided cardholders cash in amounts substantially less than the debited amount on the cardholders’ EBT card. He fraudulently redeemed EBT cards and in doing so caused a loss to SNAP and the USDA.

If convicted at trial, Saas could have been sentenced to no more than five years in prison and fined no more than $10,000.

This case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Amanda Gregory and was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the USDA.