SAN DIEGO – A federal grand jury has indicted San Diego businessman Michael A. Smith on charges that he engaged in an elaborate scheme to defraud the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the Mesa Grande Band of Mission Indians out of $1.25 million. 

According to an indictment unsealed yesterday, Smith learned that the Mesa Grande Band of Mission Indians, located in San Diego County, had access to a HUD Special Purpose Grant worth $1.25 million. Smith then devised a scheme to obtain the funds by misrepresenting
that his company, the Paradigm Group, had a housing factory that the tribe could use the grant funds to invest in.