The Federal Bureau of Investigation, BI has apprehended Ebuka Iwuagwu, a Nigerian residing in Atlanta, on allegations of defrauding the U.S. government of COVID-19 relief funds and orchestrating a substantial romance scam valued at hundreds of millions of naira, as detailed in court documents reviewed by Peoples Gazette.
Mr Iwuagwu, 39, was indicted on April 2 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio Eastern Division, presided over by Judge Calabrese.
His indictment includes eight counts of money laundering and conspiracy to commit money laundering, leading to his arrest on Monday after FBI agents connected him to four distinct complaints from victims of romance fraud that transpired between March and May 2020.
The first victim, a resident of Strongsville, Ohio, transferred $37,500 to Mr Iwuagwu. The second victim, who resided in California, sent $20,800 to an account titled Woodslayer Companies LLC, with Mr Iwuagwu listed as the sole signatory.
The third and fourth victims transferred $21,565 and $65,500, respectively, to a Trice checking account registered under a fictitious name that FBI agents suspect was associated with Mr Iwuagwu, an additional factor complicating his case.
The FBI alleges that Mr Iwuagwu conspired with others to carry out the scams while evading detection by U.S. law enforcement agencies.
During the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Mr Iwuagwu reportedly fabricated fake employee identities from his fictitious company to obtain approximately $52,000 in relief funds from the Washington Security Employment Department, thereby violating Title 18 of the U.S. Code.
“The conspirators, through a Pandemic Unemployment Fraud scheme, caused the Washington Security Employment Department to transfer approximately $51,948 in unemployment benefits intended for persons other than the defendant,” the indictment sheet for Mr Iwuagwu states.
The FBI discovered that Mr Iwuagwu withdrew and transferred the relief funds to his co-conspirators in a manner designed to obscure the money’s link to wire fraud.
Between April 3, 2020, and April 8, 2020, Mr Iwuagwu executed a series of transactions amounting to $18,000 from funds designated for unemployed individuals to his personal account.
Previously, Mr Iwuagwu had been arrested by local police in January 2024. However, the allegations of defrauding the U.S. government have made him a person of interest to the FBI, whose agents are focused on recovering the misappropriated funds.
Records obtained by The Gazette indicate that his wife filed for divorce in early 2022, with a judge granting the dissolution order in August 2022.
It remains uncertain whether Mr Iwuagwu’s criminal activities had an impact on the outcome of his marriage.
Mr Iwuagwu is the latest individual implicated in a series of Nigerian offenders currently facing trial for wire fraud.
Last week, The Gazette reported that Mercy Ojedeji, a 24-year-old former PhD student at the University of Missouri, was arrested by the FBI for falsifying academic transcripts and committing wire fraud.
In a related case, the U.S. Secret Service seized $1.5 million from the Binance wallet of Nigerian serial fraudster Avwerosuo Omokri, following multiple complaints that prompted an extensive investigation into the suspect’s activities and banking records.
Furthermore, in a similar incident, a prominent Yoruba monarch, the Apetu of Ipetumodu, Oba Joseph Oloyede, who had gone missing in March 2024, was found in FBI custody, facing accusations of defrauding the U.S. government of $4.2 million in COVID-19 relief funds.
