A Nigerian, Olusegun Adejorin, a 32-year-old, has been convicted by a US court of wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and unauthorised access to a protected computer.
Adejorin, who was extradited from Ghana to face trial, was found guilty of carrying out a fraud scheme that targeted two charitable organisations in the United States between June and August 2020.
Prosecutors told the court that Adejorin perpetrated a scheme to defraud a charitable organisation in Maryland, which provided investment services to other organisations.
Prosecutors said Adejorin registered spoofed domain names and used them to impersonate employees of the New York–based charity, requesting withdrawals of the organisation’s funds held by the Maryland-based charity.
Adejorin fraudulently obtained access to the Maryland charity’s email accounts, which he used to send emails falsely confirming fraudulent requests made in the New York charity’s name.
“He ultimately caused more than $7.5 million of Victim 2’s (New York-based charity) funds to be sent, pursuant to the fraudulent withdrawal requests, from Victim 1 (Maryland-based charity) to bank accounts that were not Victim 2’s (New York-based charity) bank accounts,” the statement reads.
“Adejorin faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison for each of the five counts of wire fraud, a maximum of five years for unauthorised access to a protected computer, and a mandatory two years, consecutive to any other sentence imposed, for aggravated identity theft,” the statement added.
Kelly Hayes, US attorney for the District of Maryland, commended the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for the investigation.
The attorney’s office stated that actual sentences for federal crimes are typically less than the maximum penalties, noting that a federal district judge determines sentencing after considering the U.S. sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors.
Theodore Chuang, US district judge, will deliver the sentence on April 10, 2026.
Veteran journalist and recipient of A.B.C Yola, Reporter of the Year Award (1997), Hassan Umar Shallpella, works with WAP as a Regional Correspondence. He was trained at Institute of Mass Communication and Technology Jos and Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, Training School Lagos.He was a News desk Editor and a Correspondent at the Punch newspaper and till 2019, was the Deputy Editor ofThe Scope newspaper.
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