FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, April 11, 2017
Nigerian Citizen Indicted on Charges of Theft of Government Funds

St. Louis, MO – Olusola Luke, 38, a citizen of Nigeria and resident of Guatemala, was ordered held and transferred to St. Louis for further proceedings on an Indictment charging him with conspiracy and theft of government funds in connection with a Stolen Identity Refund Fraud scheme he and others are alleged to have perpetrated between 2013 and 2015.

“Investigating refund fraud and identity theft is a priority for IRS Criminal Investigation,” said Karl Stiften, Special Agent in Charge. “Stealing identities and filing false tax returns is a serious crime that hurts innocent taxpayers. The arrest of Mr. Luke should serve as a strong warning to those who are considering similar conduct.”

According to the Indictment, Luke and others misused the identifiers of dozens of individuals to seek and obtain hundreds of thousands of dollars in government funds by filing false tax returns in the names of the identity theft victims. The Indictment alleges Luke and his co-conspirators sought more than $734,000 in refunds. Luke was arrested at Dulles International Airport late on the evening of April 6, 2017 and was taken into custody by the United States Marshals Service at that time. Today, he waived his right to a detention hearing in the Eastern District of Virginia and agreed to be transferred to St. Louis in custody to answer for the charges.

https://www.justice.gov/usao-edmo/pr/nigerian-citizen-indicted-charges-theft-government-funds