Jimisayo Opanuga
A Nigerian man, Tochukwu Nwosisi, 52, who lives in Indiana, was sentenced on Thursday to three years in prison for his involvement in a global advance-fee scheme that defrauded victims of over $5.6 million.
According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, from at least February 2015 to January 2018, Nwosisi participated in an advance fee scheme involving fraudulent offers of investment funding and inheritances to victims around the world.
His Nigerian-based co-conspirators induced victims to make large wire payments to bank accounts in the United States under the false belief that payment of the purported advance fees was necessary before the bank would release their funding or inheritance.
Nwosisi’s role in the scheme was to act as a money launderer; receiving the fraudulent funds into his U.S.-based bank accounts and then transferring the proceeds to the scheme’s ringleaders in Nigeria.
A federal jury in Houston on March 4 found Nwosisi guilty of conspiracy to commit money laundering and concealment of money laundering.
Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Nicole M. Argentieri, head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; U.S. Attorney Alamdar S. Hamdani for the Southern District of Texas; Special Agent in Charge Douglas A. Williams Jr. of the FBI Houston Field Office; and Special Agent in Charge Christopher Hileman of the Department of State Office of Inspector General (DOS-OIG) made the announcement.
The FBI and DOS-OIG investigated the case.
Trial Attorney Philip Trout of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Christian Latham for the Southern District of Texas prosecuted the case.
