The Illinois Metropolitan Investment Fund ran into trouble a couple years ago when one of the funds they invested in fraudulently squandered the public funds. Initially, the estimate of recovery of funds was believed to be somewhere above 80%, but was later downgraded to 47.6% of the original value of the FFF investments in a February update.IMET has only recovered around 5% of its losses incurred in this scheme so far.

In another twist, IMET and several banks filed suit on August 31, 2016, in Federal Court in Florida against the United States Department of Agriculture in an attempt at releasing the remainder of the funds. USDA says they did nothing wrong in their part of approving the applications in the process.

The alleged fraud involved phony loan documents, forged documents, fake USDA approval stamps, borrowers that did not exist, and others.

This suit complains of alleged:

Plaintiffs are seeking recovery of all their funds, including interest and fees/costs from the United States Government.