Nigerian 'Yahoo-boy' Based in the US Found Guilty of Defrauding People $7m (Photo)

Emmanuel Oluwatosin Kazeem 

A Nigerian, Emmanuel Oluwatosin Kazeem, accused of obtaining more than 125,000 stolen taxpayer identities from across the United States has been convicted in a federal court in Oregon.

He was found guilty on 19 counts of mail and wire fraud, aggravated identity theft and conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, various reports by Oregonlive.com and koin.com said.


A jury in Medford returned the verdicts Friday against Emmanuel Oluwatosin Kazeem, 34, who lived most recently in Bowie, Maryland.

Prosecutors say Kazeem bought over 91,000 of the identities from a Vietnamese hacker who got into a database belonging to an Oregon company called CICS Employment Services.

Most of the personal information belonged to people living in Oregon and Washington and were used to file fraudulent tax returns between 2012 and 2015.

Over 2,800 fraudulent returns were linked to Kazeem with attempted refunds in excess of $26 million and actual losses to the federal government of nearly $7 million.

IRS criminal investigators traced more than 2,000 wire transfers involving $2.1 million dollars in fraudulent tax refunds wired to Nigeria by Kazeem and his co-conspirators, prosecutors said. Kazeem passed many of the identities to his co-conspirators located in the Atlanta, Georgia, area and Nigeria.

He instructed them how to use the stolen personal information to get electronic filing PINs from the Internal Revenue Service in the taxpayers’ names to file tax returns. He taught them how to create fictitious W-2 wage documents and acquire and register prepaid debit cards in the taxpayers’ names to receive refunds, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors submitted evidence that Kazeem had invested more than $190,000 in cash into the recent purchase of a newly constructed home in Maryland, used $175,000 in cash to buy a townhouse in Maryland shortly before his arrest.

Evidence also found monthly credit card payments of $8300 over 4 years and plans to build a hotel in Lagos, Nigeria.

The verdict came at the end of a five-day trial before U.S. District Judge Ann L. Aiken. Kazeem is scheduled to be sentenced in Medford on Nov. 8.

Kazeem’s son, Michael Kazeem, has pleaded guilty to an indictment and awaits sentencing.

Investigators from the IRS, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the FBI and Office of Inspector General were involved in the case.

Yahoo-Boys Defraud Lagos Speaker the Sum of N9.2million Through Facebook

Speaker of Lagos State House of Assembly, Mr. Mudashiru Obasa 

Men of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), of the Lagos State Police Command, Panti-Yaba have arrested three men, accused of cyber crime and theft of N9.2million, property of Lagos State House Speaker.

According to DailyTrust, the men identified as Frank Nwokobia, 27, Ezeoke Kanayochukwu, 25, and Godwin Essien, 28 have been sent to Ikoyi Prison by a Federal High Court in Lagos, after they were docked today.


The police said the three men conspired to hack the Facebook account of the Speaker of Lagos State House of Assembly, Mudashiru Obasa, and also gained access to his account at Guaranty Trust Bank, where they stole his N9, 188,100.

The men, arrested in Delta state, were all arraigned before Justice (Professor) Chuka Obiozor, on five count charge of conspiracy, impersonation, and theft.

The Police prosecutor Barrister Williams Olu Ologun informed the court that the three accused were arrested in Delta State, after Obasa, petitioned the police that his Facebook account had been hacked into and that the sum of N9.188,100 million had been withdrawn from his account by unidentified individuals.

He also stated that upon the arrest of the accused , they voluntarily made statement admitting being into cyber crime business. The offences alleged to have been committed by the accused persons are contrary to sections 27(1)(b) and 22(2)(b)(ii) of Cybercrimes Prohibition and Prevention Act, 2015. The three accused pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Upon their pleas of not-guilty, their lawyer, Mr. Ali Abba,urged the court to admit them to bail in liberal terms,as they have credible sureties, and that they will always attend court for their trial.

Justice Chuka Obiozor, admitted the accused to bail in the sum of N5 million with one surety each. The surety must be recommended by their lawyer,who must be resident of Lagos State, with landed property and three year tax payment.

The judge also stated that the property title documents and tax payment must be verified by the court’s Deputy Chief Registrar (DCR).

Thereafter, Justice Obiozor ordered that the three accused be remanded in the prison custody ,pending the perfection of their bail conditions.