A U.S. judge has sentenced two Liberian former aid workers to nearly 12 years in prison each for stealing close to $2 million in U.S. aid that was intended to help their war-torn country.
The U.S. Justice Department says a jury convicted Joe Bondo and Morris Fahnbulleh in November of fraud and conspiracy for stealing food and construction resources when they supervised rebuilding projects for Christian humanitarian organization World Vision.
Prosecutors say the U.S. Agency for International Development awarded a grant, through Catholic Relief Services, to World Vision in 2005 for a program to rebuild communities following Liberia’s 14-year civil war. In return, USAID would distribute food to residents of the communities.
The Justice Department says a 2008 audit revealed up to 91 percent of the food never reached its intended beneficiaries. Prosecutors said Bondo and Fahnbulleh sold the food, kept the money and ordered World Vision employees to falsify reports of food distributions. They reportedly warned the employees they could lose their jobs if they did not cooperate and also paid some subordinates “hush money” to secure their silence.
The two Liberians also were said to have directed U.S.-funded workers to perform construction work on their personal compounds instead of building clinics, schools, roads and other infrastructure projects.
