ST.PAUL, Minn. – The Minnesota Board of Pardons unanimously voted to release a woman who used a fake name and documents to get a job to buy food for her seven kids. The court in Norman County in northwest Minnesota was unsympathetic in sentencing Maria Elizondo in 2012. She was given 10 years and ordered to pay back $24,700 for wrongfully obtaining welfare. She had taken a job at a turkey farm in Ada, Minnesota, under the fake name Natalia Rubio. Asked about the pardon, a son, Jorge Elizondo, said his mother, now 61, “did what she had to do” to feed her family. A recent crowd-sourced campaign produced the $$24,700 back-welfare payment.
About Norman County
Population: 6,800.
County seat: Ada.
Ethnicity: 58% Norwegian, 3% Latino.
Median household income: $32,500.
Female income: $20,600.
Below poverty: 10% plus.