Blackfeet program leaders sentenced in fraud case

HELENA (AP) — The leaders and two employees of a Blackfeet Indian project for troubled youth were sentenced Tuesday for their roles in defrauding the federally funded program.

Francis Onstad and Delyle "Shanny" Augare pleaded guilty in February to conspiracy to defraud the U.S., conspiracy to submit false claims, embezzlement from a federally funded program and income tax evasion.

U.S. District Judge Brian Morris sentenced Augare to 3 ½ years and Onstad to just over two years in prison, and he ordered them both to pay $1 million in restitution.

Onstad was the director and Augare the assistant director of the Po'Ka Project, which received $9.3 million from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services starting in 2005. The program, which was supposed to be funded completely by the tribe over time, has been defunct since the federal money ran out in 2011.

Six people in all have been convicted in the case, which is part of a broader investigation into corruption on Indian reservations in Montana.

(Details in Wednesday's Havre Daily News.)