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Counsel to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Mr Sunday Robert, said that an alleged fraudster, Olarewaju Shamsudeen who successfully defrauded Ms Margaret Philips, a U.S. citizen of 10,000 dollars after cajoling her into an online affair with him has jumped bail and is presently at large.
The EFCC said that the suspect was arrested but was granted administrative bail after presenting a surety who met all the bail conditions and was an elderly person.
The Prosecution said that the EFCC had mounted surveillance in search of the suspect and had kept the surety in custody and was ready to charge him before a court.
Robert said that before the court were exhibits of communication and receipt of payment made to the suspect’s account, alleged ID card of the said suspect, a snapshot of the suspect’s picture and record of account of the suspect.
The prosecution said that Margaret reportedly stated that Shamsudeen presented himself to her as a Major in the U.S. Army, impersonating one Major Alex Hakeem.
He further said that after she sent 10,000 dollars to him, Shamsudeen begged for more money, saying he had been deployed to Afghanistan for a refresher course and needed more money.
“She sent the money but the money came with an alarm by the bank which detected that it may be a scam”.
“That prevented his account from being credited as the money bounced back to her account so he had no access to the money”.
“Because he could not have access to the money, he called her by phone and she heard his Nigerian accent. Before the call, all forms of communication between them had been through the social media”.
“when she realized he was a Nigerian who had been acting as Major Alex Hakeem, she stopped giving him money and that was when she sent a complaint to the commission,” he said.
The Prosecution said that the EFCC used the phone number the victim forwarded to the agency to trace Shamsudeen’s BVN and realised he was truly a Nigerian.
“His bank account also showed inflow of foreign monies in which the commission is suspecting to have been gotten by ill motives,” he said.
Justice Giwa Ogunbanjo of a Federal High Court in Abuja however, on Monday ordered the EFCC to freeze the account of Shamsudeen.
Justice Ogunbanjo gave the EFCC 60 days within which to conclude its investigation and advised that the anti-graft agency should apply for an extension before the 60 days elapsed if need be.
(NAN)
