Justice Muhammed Sani of the Federal High Court sitting in Ilorin has sentenced 24-year-old Taiwo Oluwapelumi Emmanuel from Ibadan, Oyo State, to six months’ imprisonment for a one-count charge bordering on impersonation.
Emmanuel allegedly posed as a citizen of the United States of America to defraud unsuspecting victims.
Thelagostimes gathered that the defendant was among the suspected internet fraudsters arrested in the Ogbomosho area of Oyo State on October 26, 2021, during a sting operation by the Ilorin Zonal Command of the EFCC.
The defendant in his various chats claimed to be a contractor and businessman based in the United States of America, a decoy which he employed to swindle his victims.
In a related development, officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in Enugu arrested Kelechi Vitalis Anozie, a suspected fraudster who has been a person of interest to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) since 2019.
The EFCC, in a statement, said its operatives arrested Anozie on the 10th of March, following an investigative trail of activities not unconnected to fraud and illegal money laundering.
Anozie, who is a self-professed clergyman and four other suspects: Valentine Iro, Ekene Ekechukwu (alias Ogedi Power), Bright Azubuike (alias Bright Bauer Azubuike), and Ifeanyi Junior, is alleged to have defrauded one F.F, who lives in Illinois, United States, the sum of $135,800 and another $47,000.
The suspect, who is the founder of a church called Praying City Church in Owerri, Imo State, was first placed on a watch list in 2019 when the FBI announced charges against 80 people, most of them Nigerians, in a wide-ranging fraud and money laundering operation that netted millions of dollars from victims of internet con jobs.