***Three
Nigerian scammers who befriended many of their victims on dating sites
have
been slammed long prison sentences by a Mississippi court after making tens of
millions of dollars from their schemes.**
Three
Nigerian scammers who befriended many of
their victims on dating sites have been slammed long prison sentences by a
Mississippi court after making tens of millions of dollars from their schemes.
Oladimeji
Seun Ayelotan, 30, was sentenced to 95 years in prison; Rasaq Aderoju Raheem,
31, was given 115 years and Femi Alexander Mewase, 45, got 25 years behind
bars, according to a report by https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com
A court in
the Southern District of Mississippi had in February found them all guilty of
crimes including mail fraud, wire fraud, identity theft, credit card fraud and
theft of government property. Ayelotan and Raheem were also found guilty of
conspiracies to commit bank fraud and money laundering.
Dating back
to at least 2001, the scammers were involved in multiple internet fraud
schemes, resulting in losses in the tens of millions, according to the
Department of Justice.
It claimed
that they would befriend women on dating sites, establish a romantic
relationship and then either get them to send money or have them participate in
fraud schemes, usually without the victim’s knowledge.
The
unsuspecting women would sometimes be required to cash counterfeit checks and
money orders; use stolen credit card details to purchase goods; and use stolen
personal information to take over victims’ bank accounts.
They were
also apparently used to launder money via Western Union and MoneyGram, and
re-package and re-ship goods obtained fraudulently.
A whopping
21 defendants have already been charged in this ongoing case, 12 of whom have
pleaded guilty to charges involving conspiracy and 11 of whom have been
sentenced.
The three
Nigerians were among the six extradited
from South Africa by US Department of Justice in 2015 to face charges of
running a series of scams against gullible Americans over the past 16 years.
Fourteen
others resident in the US were also arrested to face trial in Gulfport,
Mississippi on nine federal charges, including conspiracy to commit identity
theft, wire fraud, bank fraud, theft of US government funds, and conspiracy to
commit money laundering.
The
indictment states that since 2001 the
accused, were part of a string of scams against Americans, facilitated by
internet communications. These include the longstanding 419 scheme, whereby a
massive windfall is promised once a small number of payments have been
provided, but the DoJ claims it went much further than that.
The team was
also accused of running romance stings to bilk the lonely of funds, shipping
fraud, running fake work-from-home businesses, check fraud, and plain-old
hijacking of other people’s bank accounts and credit cards to divert funds.
Global fraud
continues to grow thanks to the internet and an increase in the use of both
anonymizing technology and bots designed to mimic human behavior.
ThreatMetrix,
which analyzes 20 billion annual transactions, blocked 130 million fraud
attempts in Q1 alone, a 35% increase on the same time last year.
However, it
is Europe that has become a major fraud hotspot. There were 50% more fraud
attempts originating from the region than the US in the quarter, the firm
claimed.
NAN
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