The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Wednesday arraigned a National Youth Service Corps, NYSC, member and two others before an Enugu High Court for cybercrime and related offences.
Acting on a tip-off, EFCC operatives arrested the suspects, Solomon Uchendu, Ndubisi Agu and Uchendo Chikwadu, who were living at 4, Coal City University Close, Independence Layout, and charged them to court for alleged involvement in Internet crime.
According to the EFCC, investigations revealed that one of the suspects, Uchendu, is an NYSC member serving in Akoko, Ondo State.
Uchendu, who faces a seven-count charge, allegedly had about seven different email accounts which he registered with different names and used to defraud his victims who were mostly based in the United States, Canada and Germany.
Confessing his crimes in court, Uchendu said, “One Patricia from Canada gave me $1,200USD; Larisa from Germany gave him $300USD; Ethel from the U.S. also gave me $300USD. All of them know me as Lincoln, but they don’t know that I live in Nigeria.”
Along with other crimes, the charge sheet states that Uchendu “committed an offence, contrary to section 6 and section 8 sub-section( b ) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Related Offence Act 2006 and punishable under section 1 (3) of the same Act.”
The other two suspects, Agu, who hails from Umuelem in Ihitte Uboma local government area of Imo State, and Chikadu, a native of Imezi local government area in Enugu State, confessed to defrauding their victims of $1,500USD and £500 respectively.
Agu revealed to the court that he is a final year student at the Enugu State University of Science and Technology while Chikwadu, a 22-year old who is yet to gain admission into a tertiary institution, confessed possession of three fake driver’s licences procured in the names of John Omoaroijake, Gary Harry and Chikwadu Uchendu.
Admitting to the court that he met one 32 year-old nurse, Grace Talves of Blackpool, United Kingdom, on a dating site named “Tagged”, Chikwadu confessed to presenting himself fraudulently as Harry Phillp, 42, to her after which he began to send love scam mails and pictures to Talves, who is a British divorcee and mother of one, who is currently in Nigeria for an engineering job.
Chikwadu, who also admitted duping Talves of an Ipad and a Mac Air laptop, was charged with committing an offence contrary to Section 6 and Section 8 (b) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Related Offences Act 2006 and punishable under Section 1 (3) of the same Act.
The presiding judge, Justice Agishir, who adjourned the case to February 10, 2015, rejected pleas for bail and ordered that the suspects be remanded in prison custody.