Los Angeles homeless providers CEO charged with defrauding taxpayers to pay for luxurious life-style

By CHRISTOPHER WEBER

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The CEO of a Los Angeles homeless providers charity faces federal and state fraud costs after prosecutors stated he lived a luxurious life-style that included lavish holidays and designer garments paid for with $23 million in public cash meant to maintain individuals off the streets.

Alexander Soofer, 42, was arrested Friday at his $7 million dwelling that investigators imagine he afforded utilizing funds that had been alleged to assist his nonprofit Abundant Blessings, stated First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli.

The charitable group was contracted with the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, a county company, to make use of taxpayer cash to seek out shelter and supply three meals a day for greater than 600 homeless residents.

Instead, prosecutors stated Soofer purchased a $125,000 Range Rover, a $2,450 Hermes jacket, a trip dwelling in Greece and a visit to Hawaii, the place he stayed on the Four Seasons lodge that was famously the setting for the HBO TV present “The White Lotus.”

“He was living the high life while the people suffering, the homeless, lived on the streets with no shelter, no food,” Essayli stated throughout a Friday information convention with Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman.

If convicted as charged, Soofer may obtain a sentence of as much as 20 years in jail, Essayli stated. An e mail was despatched Monday searching for remark from Soofer’s lawyer, Hilary Potashner.

According to the indictment, Soofer falsified invoices to assert he was serving recent meals and renting out rooms whereas homeless individuals had been as an alternative fed canned beans and bulk packs of microwavable ramen noodles.

Investigators discovered Soofer falsified data to cowl up the truth that he paid himself to “rent” properties for homeless those that he already owned, the indictment stated.

“Mr. Soofer called his company Abundant Blessings, but the only abundant blessings were the blessings he gave himself,” Hochman stated.

During the information convention, the prosecutors pointed to considerations that billions spent to fight homelessness haven’t introduced sufficient individuals off the streets. The variety of homeless residents throughout Los Angeles County dropped 4% final yr, in accordance with the annual depend launched final July. The tally estimated that some 72,000 individuals had been residing in shelters or in sidewalk encampments countywide.

Los Angeles County officers last March moved to take management of tons of of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in spending, citing two scathing audits that discovered that the homeless providers authority spent it recklessly and with out transparency.

Between 2018 and 2025, Soofer obtained greater than $23 million in homeless housing funding. Of that, greater than $5 million got here straight from the county homeless providers authority and greater than $17 million got here via a Los Angeles-based nonprofit referred to as Special Service for Groups Inc., the U.S. Attorney’s Office stated. None of the cash got here straight from the state.

Soofer is charged federally with wire fraud and the state costs embrace 11 felony counts of battle of curiosity, two felony counts of providing false proof and 5 felony counts of forgery.

Soofer appeared in court docket Friday however didn’t enter a plea. He was launched on $1.5 million bond and is scheduled to be arraigned in federal court docket on Feb. 26. His arraignment on state costs was not but scheduled.

The arrests grew to become fodder for the continuing confrontation between President Donald Trump’s administration and California Gov. Gavin Newsom. After a conservative commentator positioned blame for the fraud on Newsom, the Democratic governor’s press workplace pushed again.

“This case was uncovered by local investigators working with law enforcement — exactly the kind of accountability and oversight the state has pushed for,” Newsom’s workplace stated.

That prompted a response by Essayli, who once more blamed Newsom.

“You and the California legislature facilitated this fraud by handing out billions in tax dollars to these nonprofits with zero vetting and zero state oversight,” Essayli stated Friday on social media.