Lawmakers and legal experts are questioning a Minnesota judge’s unusual decision to overturn a unanimous jury verdict in a $7.2 million Medicaid fraud case — a step specialists say is seldom taken in white-collar prosecutions.
The ruling, issued late last month by Hennepin County Judge Sarah West, comes as Minnesota faces a wave of high-profile welfare and human services fraud cases that have drawn national attention and rattled public trust in the state’s oversight.
West’s decision has also fueled broader debate about how aggressively Minnesota will pursue white-collar and welfare fraud at a time when billions in public funds could be at risk.
JaneAnne Murray, a University of Minnesota law professor who studies criminal procedure, said she didn’t expect the outcome.
“It is highly unusual for a judge to reject a jury’s verdict in any case, much less a white-collar one, where issues of intent will almost always be circumstantial,” Murray told Fox News Digital.
Murray noted that Minnesota’s circumstantial-evidence standard is among the strictest in the country, requiring prosecutors to “exclude any reasonable hypothesis of innocence.”
Legal observers say that demanding threshold can give judges more room to vacate convictions if the state cannot rule out every reasonable alternative explanation for a defendant’s conduct. The Minnesota Supreme Court is reviewing the long-standing standard, but Murray said West was applying the rule as it currently exists.
“The judge in the Medicaid fraud case was applying the current law,” Murray said.
Until this ruling, West kept a relatively low profile on the bench and had not issued decisions that drew significant controversy. But her move was sharply criticized by Republican Minnesota Sen. Michael Holmstrom, who called her a “true extremist.”
West, a former public defender appointed in 2018 by Gov. Mark Dayton, previously worked on juvenile and child protection matters in Hennepin County. She also held leadership positions with the Hennepin County Bar Foundation, which supports legal aid and community justice initiatives.
West oversaw the prosecution of Abdifatah Yusuf, who was convicted by a jury on six counts of aiding and abetting theft after he and his wife were accused of stealing $7.2 million from Minnesota’s Medicaid program while operating a home healthcare business, according to the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office.
Prosecutors argued the business did not have a legitimate office, operated “for years out of a mailbox,” and that Yusuf used the proceeds to finance a “lavish lifestyle,” including spending at Coach, Canada Goose, Michael Kors, Nike and Nordstrom.
West later threw out the conviction, concluding the prosecution leaned heavily on circumstantial evidence and did not eliminate other reasonable inferences about Yusuf’s role in the alleged scheme.
“There is a reasonable, rational inference that Mr. Yusuf was the owner … but that his brother, Mohamed Yusuf, was committing the fraud … without Mr. Yusuf’s knowledge or involvement,” West wrote.
She said the scale and seriousness of the alleged fraud was “of great concern,” but found the state had not proven Yusuf knowingly participated.
Andy McCarthy, a former assistant U.S. attorney and Fox News contributor, said the decision appeared to push beyond what trial judges typically do — highlighting how rare such a move is.
“It is highly unusual for a judge to overturn a jury verdict in a criminal case,” McCarthy told Fox News Digital, adding that if a judge believes the evidence is legally insufficient, the case is usually halted before it reaches a jury.
McCarthy also criticized the reasoning as described, saying circumstantial evidence frequently supports convictions.
“The fact that a case is circumstantial — meaning there is no central witness who saw the crime — is not a reason to overturn it,” he said. “Very often, circumstantial cases are much stronger than cases that rise or fall on the testimony of witnesses of dubious credibility.”
He added that jurors are instructed to consider the full body of evidence, not individual pieces in isolation.
“The judge is only permitted to vacate a guilty verdict if it is obviously irrational and against the full weight of the evidence,” McCarthy said.
Because West reversed the verdict after deliberations, McCarthy said the state may still be able to appeal — an option that typically isn’t available when a case is dismissed before a jury reaches a decision.
Ben Walfoort, the jury foreperson, told KARE he was “shocked” by West’s ruling and said the jury’s conclusion “was not a difficult decision whatsoever.”
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has filed an appeal.
The decision has also escalated into a political clash. Holmstrom sent a formal letter to West demanding she unseal key exhibits and the full case record, arguing the public “must know what is happening in their courts and in their welfare programs.”
Holmstrom called the ruling “unprecedented” and said keeping documents sealed after being used in open court conflicts with Minnesota’s tradition of transparency.
