A Nigerian man, Adetomiwa Seun Akindele, has been handed a prison sentence of five years and eleven months in the United States for defrauding an elderly woman of 1.6 million dollars in a romance scam that played out between January and October 2018. The 37-year-old, who had been living in Minnesota before his arrest, will also be deported to Nigeria once he completes his term.
Court documents revealed that Akindele assumed the false identity of a wealthy Italian-American businessman named Frank Labato and used it to gain the trust of his victim. He initiated contact through email in February 2018 and by March of that year, the two had started speaking regularly on the phone. To make his lies more convincing, he shared fabricated personal details, false professional information, and photographs that aligned with his made-up persona.
After winning her confidence, Akindele told the woman that he was experiencing a serious financial crisis related to his supposed work abroad. Believing she was helping someone she cared about, the victim opened a cryptocurrency account under his guidance and began sending him large sums of money. Investigators later discovered that Akindele converted the funds into cryptocurrencies, spread them across several wallet addresses, and deposited the proceeds into his own bank accounts. To reassure the victim, he issued three fraudulent promissory notes promising repayment, even though he had no intention of returning the money.
Judge Charlotte Sweeney of the US District Court sentenced Akindele to 71 months in federal custody after he pleaded guilty to charges of wire fraud and money laundering. He was also ordered to pay restitution of 1,692,945 dollars, with a forfeiture money judgment of the same amount. The court further directed that Akindele should be deported to Nigeria at the conclusion of his sentence.
Akindele’s conviction adds to the growing list of Nigerians facing prison sentences in the United States for involvement in financial crimes. Just days earlier, another Nigerian man, Ehis Akhimie, was sentenced to more than eight years in prison for his role in a six million dollar inheritance scam that defrauded over four hundred elderly Americans. Authorities say both cases highlight the devastating financial and emotional toll that romance and inheritance scams continue to have on vulnerable communities across the country, and they have urged the public to be cautious when approached with unsolicited online relationships that quickly lead to financial requests.