U.S. charges Nigerians for stealing millions of dollars

A Federal grand jury indictment unsealed on Thursday charged 80 people, most of whom are Nigerians, with participating in a massive conspiracy to steal millions of dollars through a variety of fraud schemes.

The Department of Justice (DoJ) said the suspects plan to launder the funds through a Los Angeles-based money laundering network.

The indictment was unsealed after the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) conducted a series of raids yesterday morning and arrested 14 defendants across the United States (U.S.), with 11 of those arrests taking place in the Los Angeles region.

Two defendants were already in federal custody on other charges, and one was arrested earlier in the week. The  remaining defendants are believed to be abroad, with most them located in Nigeria.

According to the indictment, the individuals charged used various online fraud schemes – including business email compromise (BEC) frauds, romance scams, and schemes targeting the elderly – to defraud victims out of millions of dollars.

According to a criminal complaint also unsealed yesterday, co-conspirators based in Nigeria, the U.S. and other countries contacted the lead defendants in the indictment – Valentine Iro, 31, of Carson, and Chukwudi Christogunus Igbokwe, 38, of Gardena, both Nigerian citizens – for bank and money-service accounts that could receive funds fraudulently obtained from victims.

Once members of the conspiracy convinced victims to send money under false pretences, Iro and Igbokwe coordinated the receipt of funds and oversaw an extensive money-laundering network, according to the 145-page indictment.

The indictment and criminal complaint allege that Iro and Igbokwe, who were among those arrested, were involved in schemes resulting in the fraudulent transfer of at least $6 million in fraudulently-obtained funds – and the overall conspiracy was responsible for the attempted theft of at least an additional $40 million.

The individuals named in the indictment targeted victims in the United States and across the globe, including individuals, small and large businesses, and law firms, the FBI said. Some of the victims of the conspiracy lost hundreds of thousands of dollars to fraud schemes, and many were elderly.

Each of the 80 defendants named in the indictment is charged with conspiracy to commit fraud, conspiracy to launder money, and aggravated identity theft. A number of the defendants also face substantive fraud and money laundering charges.

– The Nation