Man charged in Samoan
school food fraud
The head of the school lunch program for the American Samoa public school system has been charged with conspiring with others to steal at least $68,000 in food and goods intended for students.
Toetu Solaita was charged yesterday in documents filed by the U.S. Department of Justice in federal District Court in Honolulu.
Solaita was responsible for managing, approving requests, and distributing all food and goods purchased by the American Samoa Department of Education. The food and goods were stored in a warehouse in Pago Pago.
The school lunch program is paid for in part with funds from the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. National School Lunch Program, which requires all food purchased for the program to be used solely for feeding students in the school system.
The American Samoa School Lunch Program received $32 million in federal money from October 2002 to September 2003.
According to court documents, from October 2002 to April 2003, Solaita and unidentified others obtained food and goods through fraudulent requests and approvals.
He and his conspirators allegedly agreed that if any employee working for the school lunch program wished to take food from the warehouse, they needed to submit requests to Solaita, who approved the requests, the documents say.
Among the fraudulent requests allegedly approved by Solaita were two in October and December 2002, for a total of nearly $33,000 in food goods.