New Telegraph

LAUTECH student jailed over love scam

 

●Ogun female socialite remanded for N35m alleged fraud

Iba dan Justice Sherifat Adeyemi of an Oyo State High Court yesterday sentenced a student of the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH), Ogbomoso, Oluwatoyin Henry, to six months’ imprisonment for love scam. Henry duped an internet lover,

Betty Mosley, of $1,200 while representing himself as a United States of America citizen. Henry was prosecuted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ibadan Zonal Office. He was convicted on a one-count charge of obtaining money by false pretence.

 

The charge reads: “That you Oluwatoyin Henry sometimes in 2019, at Ogbomosho, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, with intent to defraud, obtained $1,200 from one Betty Mosley, when you falsely represented to him that you are a citizen of the United States of America by name Amanda, who is in love with him which representations you knew to be false and thereby committed an offence.”

 

The Head, Media and Publicity of the EFCC, Wilson Uwujaren, said in a statement that the convict pleaded guilty to the amended charge after a plea bargain agreement with the  prosecution. Based on his plea, he was convicted and sentenced to six months in prison.

 

“He was also ordered to restitute the sum of $1,200 to his victim, and forfeit his iPhone 11, one Infinix Hot 5 and a Nokia phone to the Federal Government of Nigeria,”

 

Uwujaren added. In a related development, the antigraft body also yesterday arraigned before Justice Abiodun Akinyemi of the Ogun State High Court 4, Abeokuta, a woman, Mary Maisirat Akerele, on a five-count charge bordering on stealing to the tune of N35,520,000.

 

Trouble started for the 46-year-old socialite, who resides at Aseko area of Idiroko, Ogun State, when the EFCC received a petition, alleging that she collected the said sum in installments from one Alhaja Oladoja Abike for the purpose of supplying four truck-load of rice from a rice milling company at Bida, Niger State, but diverted the funds.

 

The defendant pleaded ‘not guilty’ when the charge was read to her and her counsel, H. A. Omikunle, made an oral application for her bail.

However, Shamsuddeen Bashir, counsel to EFCC, opposed the application due to the defendant’s failure to keep the terms of the administrative bail earlier granted to her.

 

Justice Akinyemi therefore adjourned the case till March 4 for determination of the bail application and ordered her remand in the Nigerian Correctional Centre, Ibara, Abeokuta

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