Crime & Courts

Mat-Su farmer gets 6 months in a halfway house for federal grant fraud, prosecutors say

Federal prosecutors said Thursday a Wasilla farmer was sentenced to six months in a halfway house, five years of probation and more then a week of community service for lying to get grant money for her company.

Crystal Jean Boze, 33, was sentenced on two counts of federal grant fraud for making false claims to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, prosecutors said. She was also ordered to pay $61,415 in restitution.

Boze presented three false claims for federal grant funds to two Department of Agriculture agencies between February and June 2013, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Anchorage. She sought the grants for her Palmer company Green Winter Farms, described in an Alaska Grown newsletter as a hydroponic basil-growing operation.

The company was awarded two grants totaling about $122,000, which were to be paid as reimbursements. Officials "explicitly told Boze that advances of grant funds were not permitted," but she knowingly made fraudulent invoices to support her claims, prosecutors said.

The Department of Agriculture disbursed $48,610 to Boze before the fraud was discovered. The fraud also caused a $12,805 loss to a small Colorado vendor from which Boze obtained funds to purchase a greenhouse but didn't pay, prosecutors said.

Jerzy Shedlock

Jerzy Shedlock is a former reporter for Alaska Dispatch News. He left the ADN in 2017.

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