Nigerian goes to US prison over ₦2 billion COVID-19 benefits fraud

<p>The convict was said to have used parts of the ₦2 billion proceeds of the crime to purchase a condominium in Lekki, Lagos State, for ₦70 million.</p>, <span>Nigerian man sentenced to prison in the US Nigeriaabroad</span>, <h2>A 26-year-old Nigerian man identified as Olamide Yusuf Bakare has been sentenced to four years and nine months in prison.</h2>, <p>Bakare, according to the United States (US) Attorney’s Office, Eastern district of California, was convicted for conspiracy to commit wire fraud during the COVID-19 pandemic.</p>, <p>In a statement addressed to members of the public, U.S. Attorney Phillip A. Talbert noted that Bakare had pleaded guilty to the charges since January 2023, but just got sentenced.</p>, <p>According to court documents, between June 2020 and July 2021, Bakare, along with co-defendants Quazeem Owolabi Adeyinka and Ayodeji Jonathan Sangode, and others, participated in a conspiracy to submit fraudulent Unemployment Insurance (UI) and Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) claims to the States of Maryland and California.</p>, <p>It was gathered that more than 200 individual applications were filed with the California Employment Development Department (EDD) and the Maryland Department of Labor (MDOL) indicating that the claimants’ address was the Hyattsville, Maryland apartment that the defendants shared.</p>, <p>The conspirators obtained the Personally Identifiable Information (PII) of persons who were not eligible for UI or PUA benefits or who did not authorise the conspirators to act on their behalf with respect to seeking such benefits. Such PII were said to have included names, dates of birth, and social security numbers.</p>, <p>The conspirators then used the PII to submit dozens of fraudulent UI and PUA claims to EDD and MDOL under the putative claimants’ identities and without their authorisation.</p>, <p>"The underlying benefit applications contained fraudulent representations, including, for example, that the claimants had worked for certain employers and supervisors; had speci