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To: tntpal who wrote (49642)12/19/2025 3:17:19 PM
From: tntpal  Respond to of 49739
 
Yet more Fraud Scandals - in Massachusetts in $7 Million SNAP Scam
- Allegedly Raked In $480,000 Per Month on Taxpayer Dime
Dec. 18, 2025

Antonio Bonheur, 74, and Saul Alisme, 21 (Credit: DOJ)Federal prosecutors unsealed a major fraud indictment Wednesday, charging two Haitian migrants with operating a $7 million Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefit trafficking scheme out of two small retail storefronts in Boston’s Mattapan neighborhood.

According to a newly filed federal criminal complaint, Antonio Bonheur, 74, and Saul Alisme, 21, are each charged with one count of SNAP fraud for trafficking millions of dollars in SNAP (food stamp) benefits, turning a program meant to feed struggling families into a cash machine for fraudsters.

The USDA Office of Inspector General, working alongside the FBI, charged Antonio Bonheur, owner of Jesula Variety Store, and Saul Alisme, owner of Saul Mache Mixe Store, with food stamp fraud under federal law.

Investigators allege that Bonheur’s store, a so-called “medium grocery store” that is only about 150 square feet and lacks shopping carts, baskets, scanners, refrigerators, meat, dairy, or produce, somehow processed over $6.9 million in SNAP transactions between 2021 and 2025.

ScreenshotScreenshotTo put that in perspective:

  • Comparable grocery stores in the same ZIP code average $16,000 per month in SNAP redemptions
  • Bonheur’s store averaged nearly $300,000 per month
  • More than 70% of all transactions exceeded $150, a statistical impossibility for a shop with almost no food inventory
Investigators bluntly stated there was “no means by which hundreds of thousands of dollars in SNAP-eligible foods” could have been legitimately sold from the location.

On multiple days, investigators observed customers spending hundreds of dollars per transaction, some exceeding $700, and then walking out with empty hands or a single small plastic bag.

On May 6, 2025 alone, dozens of transactions over $100 were recorded. Not a single customer left with groceries consistent with the amounts charged.

That’s because, according to the affidavit, SNAP benefits were allegedly being exchanged for cash, liquor, and other prohibited items, a textbook example of welfare trafficking.

Even more outrageous: Bonheur allegedly applied for SNAP benefits for himself, claiming he had zero income, despite owning a business raking in hundreds of thousands of dollars per month in SNAP redemptions.