Two Nigerians have been charged in the United States with running a tax fraud scheme that lasted for years and involved stealing identities and making false claims for refunds worth more than $100 million.
ENigerian Newspaper gathered this in a report found on US Department of Justice website where the Northern District of Georgia and the Western District of Texas released indictments that named the suspects, Akinade Adedeji Raheem and Abayomi Quadri Eletu. Raheem lives in Georgia, but Eletu is said to have connections to both the UK and Nigeria. The prosecutors say they worked together, along with others, in what they call a coordinated effort to cheat the U.S. tax system.
According to the prosecutors, “Akinade Adedeji Raheem and Abayomi Quadri Eletu conspired together and with others to claim fraudulent tax refunds using the stolen identities of accountants and taxpayers.”
Authorities say the group filed more than 300 fake tax returns from 2018 to 2023 in order to get back more than $100 million. The court papers say that the suspects and their accomplices “got identifying information for tax professionals and taxpayers, such as their names, addresses, and Social Security numbers,” after making fake IRS accounts online.
The prosecutor said, “As part of the scheme, they changed the addresses of taxpayers to an address controlled by the co-conspirators, so the IRS would correspond with the co-conspirators instead of the taxpayers.”
They are also accused of sending requests to the U.S. Postal Service to change their address so that they could get victims’ mail and avoid being caught.
Further investigations into the case, which is handled by IRS Criminal Investigation and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, reveal that the suspects are said to have used the stolen identities to file fake tax returns and ask the IRS to send refunds on several prepaid debit cards. They are said to have pretended to be real taxpayers whenever verification was needed as as to keep the operation going.
As a result, the charges against the duo of Raheem, aged 43, and Eletu, aged 42, include conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud. In addition, Eletu is charged with 21 charges of aggravated identity theft, five counts of mail fraud, three counts of wire fraud, and seven counts of access device fraud. Raheem is also accused of 14 counts of aggravated identity theft and 14 counts of access device fraud.
As it stands, ENigeria Newspaper learn that the counts indicate that both men may spend up to 20 years in jail for conspiring to commit mail and wire fraud, an additional 20 years for money laundering, and up to 10 years for access device fraud if proven guilty, together with a mandatory two-year sentence imposed for each count of aggravated identity theft.
