Kansas farmer must repay government $600,000 after USDA crop insurance fraud
A Kansas farmer who defrauded federal crop insurance must repay more than $600,000, but he avoided a bill of more than $3 million in fines and restitution.
Kevin Struss, 63, of WaKeeney, was sentenced Monday in U.S. District Court to 30 months in prison, U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister said in a news release. Struss was also ordered to pay the restitution.
The Trego County farmer previously pleaded guilty to committing federal crop insurance fraud and bankruptcy fraud.
Struss had admitted in a plea deal that he defrauded the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s crop insurance program by making false statements that under-reported his crop yield. He also admitted to lying in his bankruptcy filing, hiding $470,000 that he had transferred to another person.
Prosecutors had asked for a little more than $2.1 million in restitution, and he had faced more than $1.2 million in fines — as well as up to 35 years in federal prison. District Judge John Broomes did not order a fine, and he granted only a fraction of the requested restitution.
The $604,303 Struss was ordered to pay is what prosecutors had requested to repay insurance premium benefits the farmer had received.
Government lawyers had also asked for more than $1.2 million to repay Federal Crop Insurance Corporation premium subsidies and just over $270,000 to repay administrative costs of three agencies.
The crop insurance scheme devised by Struss involved making false proof of loss statements that under-reported his total harvested bushels of corn and grain sorghum, which is also known as milo. Those crops had been insured with an FCIC subsidy. After under-reporting his crop yields by thousands of bushels, he received thousands of dollars in crop insurance benefits to which he was not entitled.
Later, he filed for bankruptcy three months after transferring nearly half a million dollars to a family member. He told the court that he had not made any such financial transactions.
This story was originally published February 10, 2020 at 8:53 PM.