Federal investigators<\/a> identified Escamex as a potential target for fraud after noticing that the low-volume grocery store was processed $732,608.26 in SNAP purchases from April 2025 to April 2026, nearly twice the amount of its closest nearby competitor.<\/p>\nTop LA Prosecutor Bill Essayli vowed to tackle welfare ripoffs. Carlin Stiehl for CA Post<\/p>\n
Cops closed the block for Thursday\u2019s sting. CA Post<\/p>\n
Investigators also determined that the store also had far bigger average purchase amounts for each SNAP transaction, in another a sign of phony purchases. In all, investigators discovered more than a $1 million in suspected fraud at the store, court papers charge. \u00a0<\/p>\n
That was enough for the feds to send undercover agents to the store posing as fraudsters.<\/p>\n
On May 18, an undercover agent posing as a ripoff artist walked into Escamex and asked if they could receive cash back on their SNAP benefits. Cervantes-Gomez told the agent to meet him in the back of the store and instructed a clerk to ring SNAP sales for $2,900.<\/p>\n
Once the SNAP purchase went through, Cervantes-Gomez gave the undercover agent $1,450 in cash and his cell number to set up more deals, court papers charge. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Agents surrounded the storefront. CA Post<\/p>\n
An undercover agent allegedly got kickbacks worth thousands. CA Post<\/p>\n
A month later the undercover agent came back and conducted a similar deal with Cervantes-Gomez, this time charging $3,240 in phony purchases and receiving a kickback of $1,740.<\/p>\n
On July 2, investigators made another plan to meet Cervantes-Gomez, telling the allegedy crooked store worker that they had $2,400 for bogus purchases that, in theory, would\u2019ve warranted a kickback of $1,200.<\/p>\n
Agents searched Escomex after arresting Cervantes-Gomez. CA Post<\/p>\n
But instead of the undercover agent showing up, uniformed officers came and took Cervantes-Gomez into custody.<\/p>\n
The alleged fraudster is charged with food stamp fraud, a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison, a fine of up to $250,000, or both. Cervantes-Gomez was being held in custody and was due to appear for a bail hearing Monday.<\/p>\n
About 5.5\u00a0million Californians receive SNAP benefits, all of it federally funded, with an average monthly benefit of about $192 per person, according to the Fiscal and Policy Advisor.<\/p>\n
SNAP EBT cards have long been a target of thieves in the Golden State, who steal their value from legitimate benefit recipients primarily through a process called card skimming, at a rate of approximately $3.6 million per month, according to Governor Gavin Newsom\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
The USDA\u2019s Food and Nutrition Administration polices SNAP-authorized stores for fraud by carrying out nearly 50,000 undercover compliance visits each year and analyzing receipts from tens of thousands of retailers. <\/p>\n
If the FNA finds evidence of fraud, investigators and agents are brought in to pursue criminal charges.<\/p>\n
FNA Acting Administrator Shiela Corley said the USDA is \u201crooting out bad actors\u201d who exploit the SNAP assistance program. <\/p>\n
\u201cFraud of any kind is a direct attack on American taxpayers and the vulnerable families who rely on SNAP,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Federal agents busted an alleged SNAP fraud ring in LA in dramatic fashion, taking down a cashier accused…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":388675,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,723,3130,47,4182,3586,14594],"class_list":["post-388674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-crime","tag-fraud","tag-los-angeles","tag-metro","tag-us-news","tag-welfare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388674","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388674"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388674\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/388675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}