Another taxpayer-funded grift artist has been stopped in her tracks.
The owner of Future Leaders Early Learning Center, who pocketed a staggering $3.67 million in child care funds in 2025 alone, has been arrested before she could escape to the UK.
Fahima Egeh Mahamud now becomes the 79th defendant charged in the sprawling Feeding Our Future fraud network, the same racket that stole hundreds of millions meant for kids’ meals and actual care.
In 2025 alone, the center reportedly hauled in a staggering $3.67 million in Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) funding.
This comes after her site was already flagged for receiving over $850,000 from the feeding scheme between 2020 and 2021, while spending only a fraction of that on actual food for children.
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According to court documents, Mahamud operated a food site, Future Leaders Early Learning Center, under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future between 2018 and 2021. Records show that Mahamud incorporated Future Leaders as a legal entity in March 2015 and participated in the Federal Child Nutrition Program under a different sponsorship. However, in September 2018, documents show that Mahamud signed a sponsor transfer request to be under the sponsorship of Feeding Our Future.
Future Leaders received funds in 2018 and 2019, but the claims were mostly “modest,” according to a special agent with the FBI, and rarely exceeded $10,000, but in December 2020, those funds dramatically increased. An affidavit in support of a criminal complaint says Future Leaders claimed to serve more than 1,000 children per day between January 2021 and June 2021. By February 2021, prosecutors say Future Leaders was claiming to serve nearly 60,000 meals to children monthly.
There was also email communication between Aimee Bock, the so-called “mastermind” behind the Feeding Our Future fraud, and another staff member at Feeding Our Future about Mahamud’s request to “increase from 500 to 1000.”
The special agent said that investigators found evidence that indicates many invoices and receipts are “inflated or fraudulent.” Some of the invoices were from a vendor of a co-conspirator who pleaded guilty to wire fraud.
The affidavit goes on to say that from December 2020 through July 2021, Future Leaders received more than $850,000 and only spent about $125,000 on food. Forensic analysis indicates that Future Leaders made payments to individuals, including $174,159 to Mahamud and $726,566 for real property purchases and $359,020 to other companies associated with Mahamud.
Court documents indicate that on February 10, 2026, Mahamud notified the Minnesota Department of Children, Youth and Families that she was abruptly closing her center.
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