Guatemalan woman living in Wright County ordered to pay restitution for illegally obtained state, federal benefits

CLARION — A Guatemalan woman living in Clarion who illegally obtained SNAP and SSI funds has been sentenced to time served.

26-year-old Aracely Batres-Alonzo had pleaded guilty in US District Court back in October to two counts of theft of US government funds.

As part of a plea agreement, Batres-Alonzo admitted that between 2016 and 2019 that she used $43,346 in the form of Supplemental Nutrition Program and Family Investment Program funds to which she was not entitled to. She fraudulently reported on her Iowa Department of Human Services applications and review eligibility documents that she and the father of her children were not employed. The investigation showed her spouse had been working under an assumed name, and that Batres-Alonzo had been employed with several different companies since April 2015 and never reported her or her spouse’s income to DHS. The unreported income would have made the household ineligible for benefits.

Batres-Alonzo, the representative payee for her minor child’s Supplemental Security Income or SSI benefit, concealed material information from the Social Security Administration in her capacity as her child’s payee and failed to report her full household income to SSA, causing her child to be overpaid $1829 between April 2018 and March 2019.

Batres-Alonzo was sentenced by US District Court Chief Judge Leonard Strand on Monday to two days time served and ordered her to make full restitution to DHS and the SSA.