Feeding Our Future was a nonprofit accused of the largest Covid fraud in the nation. They allegedly stole about a half a billion dollars from the Minnesota government under the guise of feeding school children. Dozens of people were charged as part of the conspiracy.

The first trial was held in Spring of 2024 with seven defendants. The second trial had only two defendants: Aimee Bock, the Executive Director of Feeding Our Future, and Said Salim, the owner of Safari Restaurant. Bock was the “mastermind” charged with wire fraud, conspiracy and bribery. Said took part in the scheme by fraudulently collecting money while claiming to serve 3.9 million meals to children during covid.

If my memory serves, the trial lasted about six weeks. Ultimately Bock and Said were both found guilty on all charges.

I was only present for a few select days of the trial, but here are some of the sketches I did:

Alpha News is a Minneapolis news network that positions itself as “reporting stories that are overlooked by Minnesota’s mainstream media”. After the death of George Floyd, Minneapolis Assistant Police Chief Katie Blackwell testified in the trials against Derek Chauvin and the other three officers who were with Chauvin while he held Floyd down. In court, Blackwell took to the witness stand and stated that the technique Chauvin used was not part of Minneapolis police training.

Alpha News then created a documentary “The Fall of Minneapolis” in which they alleged that Blackwell lied under oath. They accused Blackwell of making claims about police training that did not match with official police policy and training materials. (Example: MPD’s policy manual defined a neck restraint as including compression ‘with an arm or leg’ but Blackwell told the jury that police were trained to use only arms, giving them the false impression that Chauvin’s knee-on-neck technique was never part of Minneapolis police training and stating that it was “not something we train.”) Blackwell sued Alpha News for defamation, arguing that Alpha News made misleading claims that damaged her reputation and career. She called Alpha News “extremists who are more interested in shaping a narrative and provoking outrage than in communicating any version of the truth.”

On February 7, 2025 Alpha News argued before a judge that the case should be dismissed because their claims were accurate, were not defamatory, and because this case could have a chilling effect on the free speech of journalists. I was hired by Alpha News to sketch that hearing.

Ultimately the judge ruled in favor of Alpha News, stating that their claims about Blackwell were “substantively true”. Blackwell was ordered to pay $75,000 in attorney fees to Alpha News. Alpha News says their fees were “considerably higher” but they sought a lower amount “out of respect for Blackwell’s service in law enforcement and the National Guard”. Blackwell also signed a declaration affirming the finding of the judge’s order about the case were “accurate, true, and correct.”

On March 31, 2023 Madeline Kingsbury went missing from her home in Winona, Minnesota. She had recently separated from her ex-boyfriend Adam Fravel, who was the father of their two young children. Despite multiple searches with hundreds of volunteers, her body was not discovered for four months. It was eventually found in a culvert near Fravel’s parents home.

Fravel’s trial lasted about two weeks during October-November 2024. Witnesses testified that Fravel allegedly had threatened Kingsbury, struck her, and once attempted to strangle her in front of her children. However, after she went missing there was no sign of struggle in the home.

A jury found Fravel guilty on all counts. He was sentenced to life in prison.

I attended opening arguments, closing arguments, and three days of testimony. Here are a few of the sketches:

Feeding Our Future was a nonprofit accused of the largest Covid fraud in the nation. They allegedly stole about a half a billion dollars from the Minnesota government under the guise of feeding school children. Dozens of people were charged as part of the conspiracy.

The first trial was held in Spring of 2024 with seven defendants. Each defendant had their own attorney, so it was a packed courtroom with a lot of people to draw. Here’s a sampling of the sketches I did:

During jury deliberations at least one juror was let go after allegedly being offered a bribe. Ultimately the jury convicted five of the seven defendants.

Perry Stein, a writer for the Washington Post, reached out to me with a question from a reader: “Who hires courtroom sketch artists? How many attend trials?” I emailed back an answer and they used it in a Q&A blurb at the end of a recent article about the Trump trials.

I have not drawn Trump in court (yet), though I did sketch the arraignment of Trump associate Waltine Nauta in the confidential documents case. (The arraignment lasted about five minutes so I only did one sketch). The primary artists for the current New York Trump trials are Jane Rosenberg and Elizabeth Williams. But the Washington Post reached out to me via email with their question.

You can read the answer here (scroll down to the bottom).

Thanks to Minneapolis news station WCCO-TV for interviewing me for a segment on courtroom sketching. Here it is, if anyone wants to hear me babble or see what my studio looks like.

WCCO’s website doesn’t make it easy to share/repost videos so I’m not sure if the video embed will play. If not, here is the direct link to watch: https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/what-does-it-take-to-be-a-courtroom-sketch-artist/

Anton “Tony” Lazzaro was a wealthy political donor found guilty of seven counts of sex trafficking with five minors between the ages of 15 and 16. Lazarro had paid a female friend to recruit underage girls for him to party and have sex with. In return he showered the girls with money and gifts. The government said that since he was paying money for underage sex, it qualifies as sex trafficking. The defense argued that it was not sex trafficking because the sex was consensual and the money and gifts were not connected to the sex.

View my sketches of the trial here.

A jury found Lazarro guilty on all counts. He was sentenced in Minneapolis on August 9 2023 to 21 years in prison.

Waltine Nauta, while serving in the Navy, became President Trump’s valet in the White House. After Trump left office Nauta continued working for Trump at Mar-a-Lago. It is alleged that Nauta, following orders from his boss, moved boxes containing classified information from a storage room at Mar-a-Lago to Trump’s residence; that Nauta assisted Trump in concealing the documents from a grand jury, the FBI, and Trump’s own lawyers; that Nauta took a photo of spilled contents from one of the boxes with classified markings clearly labelled, and then texted the photo to a co-worker proving he knew the contents were classified; and that Nauta then lied to FBI investigators by falsely claiming that he was not aware of the boxes being moved.

On July 6 Nauta was arraigned in Miami, Florida. He pled not guilty.

This was a bit of a challenge to draw. Arraignments are often brief but this was one of the briefest I have ever seen, lasting maybe five minutes total. The court would not allow anyone to use an electronic device in the courtroom which meant no iPad. I had to draw on paper, which I haven’t done in years. And I was experimenting a bit by using pastels instead of colored pencils which I have favored in the past. I definitely felt a little rusty. After I got back home I purchased some new and improved art supplies so I can brush up on my traditional media technique.

In April of 2022 Alabama felon Casey White escaped from the Lauderdale County Detention Center with the help of a Vicky White (no relation), a corrections officer who worked at the jail. Authorities believe the pair met at the jail and developed a romantic relationship. The couple were on the run for 11 days. When the authorities finally caught up with them, Vicky committed suicide by shooting herself in the head.

Casey was originally charged with murder under the reasoning that he was responsible for Vicky’s suicide since the whole thing came about because she was trying to help him escape. In a plea deal Casey White pled guilt to an escape charge in exchange for the murder charge being dropped.

I traveled to Florence, Alabama to sketch the sentencing on June 8, 2023.

Casey White stood to address the court and the family. He said, “I feel like the most hated man in the world. I loved Vicky and I wouldn’t drag her name through the mud for anyone in this courtroom…Vicky took me out because she said, ‘Right as right. Wrong is wrong.’ She was the first person to show me affection. The first person to give me a hug in six years….I apologize to her family because she said that’s the only thing she regretted, leaving her family.”

White was sentenced by Judge Benjamin Graves to life in prison.

Casey White is already serving a 75-year sentence for a crime spree in 2015, and is also awaiting an upcoming trial for the murder of Connie Ridgeway in 2015. He is pleading not guilty by way of insanity.

The above sketches are protected by copyright but are available for licensing. Contact me if interested.

Anton Lazarro was a wealthy political donor who was charged in St. Paul, MN with sex trafficking. The trial took place in March, 2023. It was alleged that Lazarro paid a female friend to recruit underage girls for him to party and have sex with. In return he showered the girls with money and gifts. The government said that since he was paying money for underage sex, it qualifies as sex trafficking. The defense argued that it was not sex trafficking because the sex was consensual and the money and gifts were not connected to the sex.

Lazarro was charged with seven counts involving “commercial sex acts” with five minors in 2020. The minors were between ages 15 and 16. Lazarro was 30 years old. It only took the jury three hours to find Lazarro guilty on all counts. That might be the fastest verdict for any trial I have ever sketched. If not, its up there.

Because this case involved minors, I did not sketch any of the victims. As usual I also could not draw the jury, to protect their anonymity.