Pfaff’s crop insurance fraud trial delayed by 6 months – Agweek
BISMARCK, ND — A federal judge has granted a six-month stay in the jury trial of a Washburn, North Dakota farmer accused of giving false information to U.S. Department of Agriculture officials for a crop insurance compensation.
Kent S. Pfaff pleaded not guilty to the charges. He is now due to stand trial on October 18, 2022.
Mikkel Pates / Agweek
On February 2, 2022, a federal grand jury indicted Pfaff for acts he allegedly committed from January 1, 2017 to June 1, 2022. So far, Pfaff has only had the opportunity to plead not guilty.
On March 23, 2022, Judge Daniel L. Hovland agreed to “continue” or delay a trial by three days from his original schedule, which was to be April 19, 2022.
If convicted, Pfaff faces a maximum of 30 years in prison and up to $1 million in fines and five years of probation. Pfaff and his wife, Rhonda, operate a farm with sons, Stephen and Zachary, and family friend, Chris Stork.
Mikkel Pates / Agweek
Gary R. Leistico, Pfaff’s attorney of St. Cloud, Minnesota, and Acting U.S. Attorney Nicholas W. Chase and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan J. O’Konek, agreed that the evidence for the allegations is ” particularly complex”, given that they already have 14,000 discovery pages to provide to the accused “and audio files”.
On March 3, 2022, Federal Magistrate Judge Clare R. Hochhalter allowed Pfaff, who operates a farm in the Falkirk area of North Dakota, to remain free on his own until trial, and did not recover his passport.
Hochhalter, in releasing Pfaff on his own recognizance, said Pfaff had “substantial assets” and annual earnings of around $6 million. Pfaff has “all the things that make you, essentially, a North Dakota with substantial ties.”
Mikkel Pates / Agweek
The farm is known as one of the largest in the region, with tens of thousands of acres.
In the indictment filed on February 2, 2022, U.S. attorney Nick Chase said Pfaff made false statements to influence the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Risk Management Agency, which handles insurance. -crop through Federal Crop Insurance Corp.
Between January 1, 2017 and June 1, 2022. Pfaff, “falsely represented and caused another to falsely present information to RMA/FCIC to move production from different crop fields to fabricate and inflate insurance claims- harvest to which he was not entitled”, denounces the government.
Mikkel Pates / Agweek
“Production shifting is a fraudulent scheme in which a person will over-report production from one or more fields and under-report production from one or more different fields to fabricate or inflate claims to which they are not entitled” , Chase wrote in the indictment.
Chase said that between December 1, 2019 and June 1, 2020, Pfaff knowingly provided false information to Sheldon Crop Insurance Agency, FMH Ag Risk Insurance Co and Farmers Mutual Hail Insurance Company of Iowa, and a Farmers Insurance adjuster Mutual Hail. .
Mikkel Pates / Agweek
Separately, Kent Pfaff is involved in a federal civil case filed on February 22, 2022. In that case, WBI Energy Transmission, Inc., is suing for eminent domain associated with parcels of Pfaff land involved in a gas pipeline.
The defendants are Falkirk Mining Co.; Kenneth H. Pfaff (Kent Pfaff’s father) and Kent S. Pfaff, listed as trustee of the Wanda L. Pfaff Family Trust, established September 17, 1999, and personal representative of the estate of his mother, Wanda L Pfaff, who died on January 6, 2021.
An agreement filed on March 17, 2022 will allow the project to proceed but does not fully address the “scope of easement rights” and reserves rights to “compensation claims.”
Mikkel Pates / Agweek
In this case, WBI Transmission claims Eminent Domain Authority in a pipeline for WBI Energy. WBI will install 9.67 miles of 8-inch diameter lateral pipeline to Blue Flint Ethanol’s ethanol plant in McLean County. WBI says its authority comes from the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. A 60-day protest period for their prominent domain case ended on October 21, 2021.
Mikkel Pates / Agweek
“Delaying construction will result in increased costs and expenses that WBI Energy will not be able to recoup,” argued attorneys for WBI Transmission. “Delaying construction will more effectively delay the transportation and delivery of affordable domestic supplies of natural gas, delay the reduction of natural gas flaring in North Dakota, and delay compliance with state-established natural gas capture targets. “, they said.
