Minnesota ‘Culture of Fraud’ Enabled More Than $9 Billion in Misused Taxpayer Funds, Panel Says

A “culture of fraud” infected Minnesota state agencies, resulting in more than $9 billion in taxpayers’ money squandered, a new legislative report says. “We finally pulled the curtain back—and the public is grateful,” state Rep. Kristin Robbins, chair of the Minnesota House Fraud Prevention and State Agency Oversight Committee, said May 13 during a session that summarized 16 months of investigative work. Many fraudsters “came to believe that fraud was tolerated and paid in a big way,” according to a report that Robbins released at the meeting. The report summarizes the committee’s attempts to dissect how state agencies became so mired in fraud....