A North Pole woman is facing felony theft and fraud charges for allegedly collecting $31,113 in food assistance she wasn’t eligible for.
A court summons was issued for 31-year-old Ariel Purdy Feb. 25. Charging documents say Purdy failed to report income, household makeup, and other resources accurately in forms she submitted to Alaska’s Division of Public Assistance. The division administers the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which provides benefits to help low-income Alaskans purchase food.
The charges against Purdy, filed by the state’s Office of Special Prosecutions, relate to SNAP benefits she received between December 2022 and June 2025. She’s gotten the benefits in various years over the last decade, investigators say, but the charges don’t date back that far.
Court documents say the eligibility review forms at issue – in 2022, 2023 and 2024 – list $389 in child support as her monthly income. Purdy didn’t list financial accounts on any of the forms and reported household members as herself and her two children, according to the court documents.
Investigators say they reviewed Permanent Fund dividend applications that showed she and her boyfriend had the same address and used the same bank account for direct deposit in 2021 and from 2023-2025. Investigators also say they obtained records from Credit Union 1 that indicated Purdy and her boyfriend shared a joint bank account, and that he had received money from multiple employers between 2022 and 2025.
The charging documents say investigators additionally reviewed a 2024 credit application in which Purdy said she’d been the manager at A&F Pilot and Escort Service for four and a half years, which hadn’t appeared on her SNAP applications.
The Office of Special Prosecutions included a chart with the charges that purportedly showed the household's income exceeded the SNAP income limit for 31 months straight, ending with June 2025.
According to the charging documents, Purdy said in an interview in November that she applied for the benefits because she’s a single mother, with two children and a third on the way.
Purdy faces one count of first-degree theft and felony scheme to defraud, as well as four misdemeanor counts of falsifying records. Her boyfriend has not been charged.