A 27-year-old Nigerian man has sentenced to two years in jail in the United States for bilking East Texans and others out of nearly $ 1 million.
Fawaz Olarenwaju Animasaun is one of two people named in a federal indictment for charges of aggravated identity theft and conspiracy to commit bank fraud, as well as aiding and abetting.
Animasaun was arrested in November 2016 when he arrived New York from Ghana, by way of Amsterdam, on a Delta Airlines international flight 9348. airport. Few weeks later, he was sent to the Gregg County Jail awaiting his turn in a federal courtroom.
Under a plea agreement finalized in May, Animasaun is serving three years in prison on the conspiracy charge. He is ordered to pay $ 930,737.60 in restitution to three financial companies. Court documents show Animasaun will pay $ 135,989 to East Texas-based Austin Bank as part of that restitution.
In addition, the agreement states that Northern Trust Company is due $ 46,800 and UMB Financial Corporation is due $ 747,948.60.
Animasaun and his alleged accomplice Idowu Temitope Omolade, also from Nigeria, are believed to be involved in at least 21 fraudulent wire transfers between April and August of 2012. A rare footnote made by a U.S. Attorney in the 21-page federal indictment reads:
“Because the purpose of this complaint is to set forth only those facts necessary to establish probable cause to arrest, I have not described all the relevant facts and circumstances of which I am aware.” The indictment says the purpose of the conspiracy was to “… unlawfully obtain money through unauthorized transfers of funds from bank accounts and brokerage accounts.” The Nigerian men allegedly impersonated actual account holders in emails exchanged with banking and financial services personnel. In those email conversations, the indictment says the suspects “harvested details about the target accounts, including account balances, and obtained wire transfer instructions.” With those details, the suspects were then able to initiate a wire transfer without the account holder’s knowledge or authorization.
The indictment said that the money was moved through a series of accounts using “money mules,” or people who may or may not have known they were assisting in the transfer. Other financial institutions affected include Wells Fargo, UMB Bank, UMB Financial Corporation, Northern Trust and Northern Trust Corporation.
Animasaun was transferred out of the Gregg County Jail on June 28, in the custody of the U.S. Marshals. Federal Bureau of Prisons records show he is now in a detention center in Brooklyn, New York, and will remain there until June 2019. He could have received up to 30 years in prison for each count of the indictment. The indictment states that Animasaun kept Omolade informed of the progress, and told him when to expect specific wire transfers. Omolade is not listed as a federal inmate, and there is no record of an arrest. Aliases listed in the indictment include “Michael Chernick” and “CLICKIDONLINE.” Animasaun is listed in the indictment with four aliases, including “Larry Hoover” and “Slim Husstle Olanraywaju.”
Psy’s ‘Gangnam Style’ loses it’s spot as YouTube’s most-watched video to Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth’s ‘See You Again’ after 5years
Psy's 'Gangnam Style' loses it's spot as YouTube's most-watched video to Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth's 'See You Again' after 5years ‘Gangnam Style,’ the megahit of South Korea’s Psy has lost the number one spot as YouTube most-watched video after five years. The song, released in 2012 received 2,894,387,295 views till date but was still overtaken today by the heartwarming track ‘See You Again’ from the film Furious 7 by Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth. As at today, the heartwarming track has 2,895,253,744 views on YouTube, more than Gangnam Style’s 2,894,387,295 views. The third most-watched YouTube video of all time is Justin Bieber’s ‘Sorry’, released a year ago with 2,635,516,833 views. ‘See You Again’ was a song dedicated to Paul Walker and was included in the Furious 7 soundtrack after he died in 2013 when his Porsche crashed and burst into flames.
The management of a private mortuary, Toluwalase Hospital Morgue, located at Otunba Oladokun Street, in Igando area of Lagos State has ejected corpses deposited in the facility due to massive flooding of its premises. This is coming on the heels of the ceaseless rainfall witnessed across Lagos metropolis last week, which led to flooding.
Flood ‘Chases’ Corpses Out of Mortuary In Lagos
The flood has taken an immense toll on the facility, forcing its operation to stop.
According to the mortuary’s manager, Bolaji Oluwafemi, the area was flood prone and always quick to transform into a lake anytime it rained.
He added that the Lagos State Government had ignored repeated complaints from the hospital management and other residents living in the area.
“There is the lingering need for proper channelization of water and the sand filling of the low land in the area”, Oluwafemi further explained.
Due to the neglect by the government, the morgue manager said they, alongside other residents, hired a contractor to sand fill the lowland and divert the flood water to a nearby drainage, incurring N3 million as expenses for the job.
Oluwafemi, a retired Naval officer, said: “It has paralysed our business, everybody has moved of their houses to live in the available dry land outside of their premises.
“We have been living outside in our cars. Look, (pointing at cooking utensils) that is where we cook our food.
“The woman that sells food has vacated her flooded shop. All the tenants and landlords are out of their houses. On Monday, a woman was searching for her daughter in the flood while others hurried out of their houses.
“We are left with nothing!”
Oluwafemi and other residents seen with him pleaded with the state Governor Akinwunmi Ambode to come to their rescue.
SoNature: Oh, shut up! People like you merely employ terribly poor writers (because u want to cut cost!), thus saturating Nigerian blogosphere with poorly written articles!
ToluNewman: 30-50 post per day for 20k monthly. You are a slave trader
Why do people like jumping into conclusion easily? Writing 50 short blog posts is more or less easier than writing 50 Facebook updates. Are you better off than people sending their applications?
Please have a nice day and stay off my topic if you don't have anything interesting to say.
The lengthy trial of Olympic gold medalist Oscar Pistorius seems to have arrived to an ending today after the runner was handed a six-year-prison sentence for killing his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp in 2013.
Oscar had told a South African court that he thought Reeva was an intruder and shot at the door out of fear killing the lady instantly.
Presiding judge justice Thokozile Masipa who found Oscar guilty of murder ruled that some "circumstances" made her not sentence the 29-year-old athlete to the 15 years minimum sentence of Oscar.
Oscar kissed his sister Aimee Pistorius goodbye (pictured above) before being led to prison afterwards.
According to the person who sent these pictures in, the armed robber pictured below was tied and lynched by residents of Aba in Abia State on the evening of Monday 4th July 2016.
An armed robbery gang reportedly gained access to Umuode Community in Aba for an operation on Monday evening, however, unknown to the robbers, the local vigilante security men had been prepared for such attacks.
It was during the exchange of gunshots that one of the robbers was nabbed while the others escaped. An angry mob descended on the robber and instantly beat him to death.
Niger Delta Avengers blow up four oil installations as Twitter account gets suspended
Pipeline-bombing Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) militants claim they have destroyed four oil facilities on the night of Monday July 4th 2016, hours after their Twitter handle was taken down by the social media website.
The avengers wrote on their website: At 10pm Nigerdelta Avengers blow up Chevron Well 10 close to Otunana flowstation. other attacks was carried out at At 11:15pm Nigerdelta Avengers blow up NPDC Manifold close to Banta and two PPMC/NNPC crude oil trunk Lines. Brig.Gen Mudoch Agbinibo Spokesperson
A blog reader confirmed to NGLatest that loud explosions were heard in the city of Warri in Delta State on Monday night. The sound could be connected to the recent bombings by the NDA militants.
People react as man chops off teacher's joystick for raping 11-year-old daughter
In Limpopo, South Africa, a father is wanted by Police after cutting off a 58-year-old school principal's joystick for sleeping with his 11-year-old daughter. The names of the victim, father and principal were not released to the media.
Senior Police officer Ngobeni who spoke with newsmen said: "Locals alerted police and we rushed to the spot. We picked him up, his private parts, and took him to the hospital.
"There is nothing below the belt now, everything was chopped off. The hospital could not reattach his belonging but he lived." The incident which happened on Friday 1st July has attracted reactions from all over South African social media.
An indigenous Nigerian company based in Benue State has designed, engineered and manufactured a new brand of keke (tricycle) dubbed the Wazobia Tricycle. The tricycle was produced by Chinatown & Benue Valley Vehicle Manufacturing Co, owned by Benue indigene Mr Stine Chenge who said a unit of the multi-purpose tricycle will cost 250,000 naira.
His words: "Since our products are manufactured within Benue State, our prices are considerably cheaper at just N290,000 per units from 1-10, N250,000 for units from 11-50 and N210,000 for unit from 51-100. Our current production capacity per month is 50 units. This is cheaper than the Chinese or Indian products currently being sold for N450,000 and sometimes as high as N650,000.
"It is our desire to continue to improve and make many models and call on Businesses, Government and the good citizens to patronise our products. ." More photos:
UBA chairman Tony Elumelu honors security man who returned N3.5m he found outside UBA branch
Billionaire Tony Elumelu today honored Mohammed Ibrahim Ogbanago, a security guard attached to an Ikeja, Lagos State branch of the bank who returned $10k (about 3.5m naira using the current exchange rates) he picked outside his duty post.
Elumelu wrote: "Last month, Mohammed Ibrahim Ogbanago, a security guard at the @ubagroup branch in Oba Akran, found $10,000 outside on the ground at his branch. In an unparalleled display of integrity, he decided to return the money.
"When I heard about this story, I knew I had to meet the man who despite facing rising petrol & transportation prices and “tomato ebola” returned such a huge sum of money without recourse to himself.
"It was a pleasant surprise to hear him tell this story and about how he came to be in the board room with us. Even more surprising was hearing him speak about his passion for governance and integrity in leadership.
"Mohammed Ibrahim Ogbanago is an exemplary ambassador of the UBA spirit and it was fulfilling to meet and reward him for his conduct.
"The UBA Group management is proud to have this caliber of staff at all levels. Congratulations to Mohammed and keep up the good work."
Honorable minister of the Federal Minister of Environment Amina Mohammed shared this photo on Twitter which she tagged: "My social media team at the FMENV (Federal Ministry of Environment) spreading the virus in yet another Agency! Young people taking the lead. Amazed!" Many people are of the theory that all is not well with the title and content of the photograph, suggesting that the number of people in the "social media team" are in the excess, and also wondering what so much amount of people could be doing for a single Federal Government ministry to justify their salaries.
In one phrase: salaries paid to these "social media" people are waste to the dying Nigerian economy.
A man believed to be in his mid-50s, has reportedly beheaded a 70-year-old man at Hohoe in the Volta Region on Tuesday.
The suspect, Fred Mensah was said to have met the the old man on his way to the farm and butchered him without an provocation.
He chopped off the head and hands of the old man who was working on his farm.
After the dastardly act, the suspect who is said to be mentally challenged paraded the town with the severed head and hands following which he was arrested by the youth of the town who called in the police.
Eben Salifu, a resident, who spoke to Adom News’ Kofi Adjei said the timely intervention by the police saved the suspect from being lynched by the angry residents.
Meanwhile, the police have commenced investigations into the matter while the body has been conveyed to the Hohoe Government Hospital.
The suspect is currently behind bars at the Hohoe Police Station.
A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja has annulled the election of governor Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State, ordering the handover of the state mantle of leadership to Uche Ogah who secured second position during PDP's primary elections in the state. Presiding over the matter, justice Okon Abang ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission to award a certificate of return to Uche Ogah.
Justice Abang ruled that the court has found Ikpeazu to have submitted forged tax return papers to INEC prior to Abia State gubernatorial elections in May 2015.
Politics › Photos: 27-year-old Nigerian Man Jailed In The US For $1 Million Bank Fraud by missNGLatest(op): 1:35pm On Jul 11, 2017
