A 35-year-old Nigerian man, Lotenna Chisom Umeadi, extradited from Germany to the United States of America, has pled guilty on two counts of wire fraud.
This was revealed by the United States Attorney John A. Sarcone III and Erin Keegan, Special Agent in Charge of the Buffalo Field Office of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) on Thursday, March 20 2025.
Umeadi confessed to soliciting and purchasing a webpage from a computer hacker which allowed him to illegally gain access to people’s email passwords which he used to gain access to email accounts belonging to employees of a produce exporter in Sri Lanka.
The accused then sent fraudulent emails, which appeared to legitimately come from the produce exporter but were, in fact, from an email account set up and controlled by Umeadi, directing payment on the Sri Lankan company’s accounts receivable be made to bank accounts in the United Kingdom, controlled by Umeadi.
As a result of the fraudulent emails from Umeadi, on two occasions in 2016, a produce importer in Plattsburgh, New York, wired money, totalling $158,400, to those bank accounts in the United Kingdom.
Umeadi was arrested on the charges on September 1, 2024, by authorities in Germany when he arrived there from Nigeria.
Umeadi was then extradited from Germany to the United States.
His sentencing is scheduled for July 21, 2025 and he faces a maximum term of 20 years in prison, a fine of up to $250,000, and a term of supervised release of up to 3 years.