Exclusive | Feds smash multi-million dollar homeless scheme as charity worker with shady list of ghost clients dragged from her home

A charity worker who allegedly took massive bribes in exchange for pouring millions of taxpayer dollars into the pockets of a corrupt homeless service bigwig was busted by the feds in a sweeping operation that targeted infamous homeless services fraud in that’s crippling Los Angeles.FBI agents in a dramatic raid swarmed the South Los Angeles home of Lakiya Malone before dawn, pounding on her door and yelling for her to “come out!”As the SSG worker emerged, she was placed in handcuffs by men in Kevlar vests, while others trained rifles on her house.FBI agents collared Malone, 48, more than seven months after the federal government charged charity leader Alexander Soofer, 42,  with stealing $23 million in public funds meant for the needy.And while agents stuffed her into a silver sedan, other FBI men were hot on the trail of two other suspects caught up in a sweeping operation meant to root out fraud at the Los Angeles Homless Services Authority.Top Los Angeles prosecutor Bill Essayli said the Homeless Fraud and Corruption Task Force he’s leading will stop at nothing to root out massive fraud at the lead agency that coordinates housing and social services for the homeless in Los Angeles County.“We’re working our way up the chain.We’re getting to those who are enabling the fraud, and not just the fraudsters themselves.” he told the California Post.

“The money went to enrich these fraudsters directly.”“That’s where the taxpayer’s money is going — and it’s not going to the homeless,” he added.The LAHSA has had recurring problems with corruption and late payments to nonprofit providers – things the Trump administration has named as its motivation for suspending federal funds to the joint city-county agency.Malone is part of the problem, according to the feds.She is charged in a 21-count federal indictment that accuses her of taking more than $180,000 in bribes and kickbacks from Soofer, the executive director of the homeless services ...