A Mississippi court has sentenced three Nigerians to 235 years in prison for running an online scam that netted them tens of millions of dollars in profits.
Oladimeji Seun Ayelotan, 30, was sentenced to 95 years in prison, while his accomplices Rasaq Aderoju Raheem, 31, received 115 years and Femi Alexander Mewase, 45, received 25 years. The judges found them guilty of mail fraud, identity theft, credit card fraud and theft of government property.
Ayelotan and Raheem were also found guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud and money laundering, which explains their longer sentences. All three were members of a 21-man gang operating in Nigeria and the US. Twelve of them have already pleaded guilty.
According to their testimonies, the gang had been operating since 2001 and was running various projects to deceive the public. One of these projects was “romance scams.” The defendants would find victims who were feeling lonely and convince them to pay for plane tickets or medical expenses to meet up. Of course, no one showed up for the appointment…
Such scams appear to be remarkably successful. Last year, a British man was scammed out of $150,000 and a British woman lost $1.6 million over a ten-month period.
The gang used Western Union and MoneyGram to receive the money, or sold goods purchased with stolen credit and debit cards in countries where they could be sold for much more money.
The group was arrested by South African police in a joint operation with U.S. Customs and Border Protection Homeland Security and Immigration investigators and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.
According to the International Police Organization (Interpol), West African fraudsters have managed to earn over $3 billion from online scams in the past three years. The international police said that the reason why Nigeria is a hotbed of online crime is because of the low employment prospects in the country for computer specialists.
