ZEPHYRHILLS, Fla. — Florida families are losing hundreds of dollars in SNAP benefits to fraud, with multiple victims in the Tampa Bay area saying unauthorized charges on their accounts are being traced to the same California address — and the state is offering no way to get that money back.
Cheyenne Smith, a stay-at-home mother of four, whose husband works as a truck driver, said she first noticed something was wrong when an unauthorized charge came off her card. She canceled it immediately.
"Not even five minutes after that, and you can look on the time stamps, it literally went through for the second transaction of $325.18. But how can that happen… when I canceled the card?" Smith said.
WATCH: 'It's either eat or pay bills': Florida families desperate for answers after losing SNAP benefits to fraud
The fraud did not stop there.
"It's happened over a span of a week. I've went through three cards," Smith said.
"The locks, the canceling the card, the changing my PIN, nothing worked. Because they're just messing with it over and over again," Smith said.
Smith said the fraudulent charges appeared to be DoorDash transactions originating from Glendale, California. When she contacted DoorDash directly, she said the company told her the transaction did not exist.
"So, when I called DCF... It says sorry, we're too busy, and it hangs up on you. And you literally have to call multiple times a day for days, and maybe, if you're lucky you can get through," Smith said.
Her family is now facing the consequences.
"I rely on my food stamps, you know, to get through the month. It doesn't last all month, but it supplements," Smith said. "It really does hurt my family. Immensely."
"I got food right now, but come, you know, next week and the week after — the fridge is not going to look this colorful," Smith said. "This is going to be gone in, you know, no time."
Smith is not alone.
Shayna Houser Parra, who lives in Plant City, told the I-Team her SNAP benefits card declined while she was grocery shopping with her kids.
"Everything on the app was red, like flagged," Houser Parra said. "All my money was gone, it said insignificant funds."
"We walked out empty-handed," Houser Parra said, recalling how she cried the whole drive home. "I'm going to cry now."
Houser Parra has five children — her oldest is 9, her youngest is 9 months, and her 7-year-old has autism. Her husband works as a General Manager for Dollar General.
"We still haven't had all our bills covered this month because of this. It's either eat or pay bills," Houser Parra said. "We have been to a few food pantries this month that we've actually been turned away, because they've ran out."
Houser Parra said scammers also locked her out of her own account entirely.
"My biggest fear of all is I still can't log into this app," she told the I-Team. "They changed my email. They changed my password, my login. Everything, my pin."
The two mothers, plus a third in Port Richey, found each other on Facebook, where Houser Parra said she initially mistook screenshots of another victim's account for her own, until she noticed a different date. All three victims identified so far had fraud occur within the same month, and all traced to the same California address.
"I realized — I'm not the only victim," Houser Parra said.
Smith said the connection between victims would have gone unnoticed without social media.
"You're not hearing about it, like, unless I Google the address that the delivery is being made to, I would have never found the other two mothers that this happened to in the Tampa Bay area," Smith said. "It was a shock."
The Florida Department of Children and Families directs fraud victims on its website to file a report with local law enforcement, treating these as individual cases.
A 2-year federal program that reimbursed victims of SNAP benefit theft ended in 2024. According to a document the I-Team obtained from the USDA, state agencies were told they could "choose to replace stolen benefits using state funds." Florida has not done so.
That same document encouraged state agencies to transition to SNAP EBT chip cards to safeguard against fraud. That transition has also not happened in Florida.
Houser Parra questioned why the state has not acted.
"I know for a fact, you know, we're not the only people and the state's not wanting to help us, so my question is, why is the state just so willing to lose money?" Houser Parra said.
Both Houser Parra and Smith told the I-Team they are speaking up for others who will not.
"There's people that are not talking about this. There's people that are too ashamed," Houser Parra said.
Smith said the families affected deserve to be heard.
"We still matter," Smith said. It's not fair, essentially. But life's not fair, but it should be a matter of importance. And — it's not."
The I-Team first contacted DCF more than a week ago and has not received any answers about what is being done to investigate allegations of fraud. The I-Team also contacted Florida's Chief Financial Officer, Blaise Ingoglia's office.
In an email Monday evening, the CFO's communications director told the I-Team, "DCF’s Office of Public Benefits Integrity refers these cases to the appropriate local law enforcement agency. We provide assistance to local law enforcement agencies with financial crimes when they request it. We encourage anyone who believes they are a victim of fraud to report it to their local law enforcement agency immediately."
The I-Team has followed up with more questions.
If you have had a recent unauthorized charge to a SNAP account, the I-Team wants to hear from you.
Share Your Story with Kylie
Kylie McGivern works tirelessly to get results for the people of Tampa Bay. Her reporting has exposed flaws in Florida’s corrections system and unemployment process. Reach out to Kylie and our I-Team if you need help holding state leaders accountable.
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