Crime & Safety
Alameda Woman Must Pay Back $111,000 in Child Care Fraud Case
Khadijah Aii posed as a homeless single mother while living with her husband and their three children in a home they owned in Alameda, the district attorney's office says.
Bay City News Service—Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O'Malley announced Friday that her office has won a $111,400 settlement in the largest single child care fraud restitution order in the county's history in a case that went on for nearly a decade.
According to O'Malley, Khadijah Ali, a full-time employee of the San Francisco Unified School District who is married to a full-time civilian employee of the Alameda County Sheriff's Office, took $185,032 from the state by posing as a single, homeless mother of three children from October 2002 through September 2011.
The money came from 4C's of Alameda County, a nonprofit agency that's funded by the California Department of Education, which will receive the settlement funds.
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O'Malley said that although Ali claimed that she was a homeless single mother, she in fact lived with her husband, Malik Ali, with their three children in a house in Alameda that they had bought together in 2005.
She said the couple's children enjoyed the benefits of both parents' incomes, which were above the threshold to qualify for child care assistance, as well as medical and dental insurance through their father's job.
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O'Malley said Ali "concealed or lied about these facts every year for nine consecutive years, thereby defrauding Alameda County of a total of $185,302 in grant money designated for children in need."
The fraud was detected by an employee of 4Cs and reported to the district attorney's office, according to O'Malley.
She said Khadijah and Malik Ali were charged with several felonies, including conspiracy to commit fraud and grand theft and Khadijah Ali pleaded guilty to felony grand theft and was placed on five years' probation but criminal charges against Malik Ali were dismissed.
O'Malley said, "Investing in early childhood development confers advantages on children that are as well-documented as they are profound" but because funding for these programs is limited, "applicants who falsify their need are stealing money set aside for the legitimately needy."
The suit against Khadijah Ali was filed last July and was settled in a negotiated disposition on Monday.
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