A 30-year-old St. Paul, Minnesota, man has been charged in a Medicaid fraud scheme allegedly linked to several people accused of running a sex trafficking operation in Hennepin County, according to court documents.
A criminal complaint filed in Ramsey County charged Salman Ahmed Elmi with three counts of aiding and abetting theft by swindle and five counts of aiding and abetting theft by false representation.
According to state records, Elmi previously received the Outstanding Refugee Award for Entrepreneurship from the Minnesota Department of Human Services.
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Elmi, Frank Reeves, Viktoriya Komonash and Andrea Sampson are accused of operating four agencies: Reva Health, Reva Autism, Helpful Housing and Homefelt Assisted Living. The complaint alleged that the agencies billed Medicaid for more than $4.5 million since 2023.
According to court documents, the alleged fraud scheme involved recruiting young women who were homeless or struggling with addiction, housing or financial problems. The defendants allegedly rented houses in the women’s names using fake pay stubs and enrolled them in a scheme in which they were paid for sex, which investigators say they have been tracking since 2019.
The complaint noted Elmi and others began stealing victims’ identities to bill Medicaid in their name. Elmi got a loan, and incorporated Reva Health. Since then, he transferred nearly $150,000 from those accounts to his own business, as per the court documents.
Elmi was taken into custody as a warrant was issued for him on Thursday. He was released Monday after a judge ordered him to surrender his passport and remain in Minnesota. His next court hearing is set for Oct. 4.
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According to Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty, Reeves, Sampson and Komonash were taken into custody without incident on Aug. 14.
Heidi Kleg, who works for Breaking Free, a Minnesota group that helps people escape trafficking, said the incident is “incredibly significant,” and indicative of “what trafficking is as a whole.”
“These are not gangs; they’re not scary people ripping people off the street. These are people that you work with every day. They’re people living in our communities, that are living next door to us, that participate in these things,” Kleg said.
The charges also alleged that Elmi used his partial ownership of Minneapolis-based startup Tavolo to obtain a loan to launch Reva Health, according to Fox News. Tavolo had previously received funding from Shark Tank star Kevin O’Leary. Elmi is listed as a founder of Tavolo, an AI-powered marketing app for restaurants.