Federal authorities arrested a man accused of stealing $600,000 from the food stamp program after he skipped court, drove to Canada, and fled to India, the fifth fugitive captured under the FBI's new fraud crackdown in three months.
Indian authorities took Manjit Singh Bedi into custody Friday at the FBI's request, ending a manhunt that began after the Tacoma, Washington, grocery store operator allegedly violated the conditions of his federal supervision and disappeared overseas. The FBI is now working to bring Bedi back to the United States to face charges of wire fraud and fraud against the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the federal food benefit system commonly known as food stamps.
Bedi ran a small shop called Asian Grocery Store in Tacoma. Between March 2024 and June 2025, he allegedly swiped customers' Electronic Benefits Transfer cards, the debit-style cards the government issues to SNAP recipients, without actually selling them food. Instead, he handed customers cash and kept roughly half the benefit money for himself. The scheme drained at least $600,000 from a program meant to feed low-income Americans, federal authorities said.
After a federal grand jury indicted Bedi on the fraud charges, a court allowed him to appear without placing him in custody. He was ordered to surrender his passport and stay in Washington state.
He did neither. Bedi allegedly drove north across the border into Canada and then caught a flight to India. A federal arrest warrant was issued on May 21, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington after he was charged with violating the conditions of his supervision.
The FBI placed Bedi on its Most Wanted Fraudsters list. Fox 13 Seattle reported that Bedi is a naturalized U.S. citizen, a man who took an oath of allegiance to the country he then allegedly robbed.
Bedi's arrest marks the fifth capture under the FBI's Most Wanted Fraudsters initiative, which launched in June. Fox News reported that the five fugitives taken into custody through the program are collectively accused of more than $2 billion in fraud and had spent nearly 4,000 combined days as fugitives before being caught.
FBI Director Kash Patel framed the results as a warning.
"Five Most Wanted Fraudsters captured in just three months is a historic success for this initiative. The days of taking advantage of American taxpayers without consequence are over."
Assistant Attorney General Colin M. McDonald, who heads the Justice Department's Fraud Division, was equally direct.
"As this arrest in India shows, the Justice Department's reach extends to every corner of the planet. The Fraud Division will continue to work hand-in-hand with the FBI to ensure fraudsters like Bedi are held accountable, no matter where they hide."
Bedi's case is not an isolated incident. In June 2026, several illegal immigrants were arrested in Massachusetts and charged in a separate $1.4 million food stamp fraud scheme. That case involved a different network but the same basic hustle: exploiting a taxpayer-funded safety net for personal profit.
And the rot runs deeper than individual scams. The U.S. Department of Agriculture revealed in May that 14,000 people in a single state were collecting food stamps while driving luxury vehicles. The state was not identified, but the figure alone suggests that oversight of the $100-billion-plus SNAP program has been woefully inadequate for years.
Bedi's alleged scheme was small by comparison to the billions in total fraud the FBI's initiative has targeted. But the mechanics of his case expose a recurring failure: a man indicted on serious federal charges was allowed to walk out of court, keep his freedom, and leave the country before anyone stopped him. By the time the warrant came down in May 2026, Bedi was already overseas.
The FBI says it is preparing to return Bedi to the United States to stand trial, though no specific timeline for extradition has been announced. The exact location of his arrest in India has not been disclosed. Federal authorities have not said how long he had been in the country or whether he had established a new life there.
The Department of Justice posted about the arrest on X, calling Bedi the fifth "Most Wanted Fraudster" captured. The post carried the unmistakable tone of an agency eager to show results, and with five arrests in ninety days, the numbers back up the message.
Whether the broader initiative can sustain that pace remains an open question. But for taxpayers who fund SNAP and every other federal benefit program, the principle is straightforward: steal from the public, flee the country, and the government should still come find you. For too long, that did not happen. If the current pace of enforcement holds, the fraudsters who treated American generosity as a personal ATM may finally learn that the bill comes due, no matter how far they run.
