In a significant victory for law enforcement agencies combating transnational organized crime, a federal jury in Puerto Rico has convicted 37-year-old Nigerian national Oluwasegun Baiyewu of conspiracy to launder funds derived from wide-ranging international fraud schemes. This conviction marks the fifth in a series of prosecutions targeting a group of Nigerian nationals involved in sophisticated financial crimes that exploited vulnerable populations in the United States.

According to a statement released by the Office of Public Affairs of the US Department of Justice, Baiyewu, a resident of Richmond, Texas, was found guilty following a 22-day trial held in San Juan. His conviction follows those of four co-defendants: Oluwaseun Adelekan, 40, and Temitope Omotayo, 40, both of Staten Island, New York; Ifeoluwa Dudubo, 37, of Austin, Texas; and Temitope Suleiman, 37. Collectively, these individuals were implicated in complex schemes designed to launder illicit proceeds from various international fraud operations.

Court documents reveal that the defendants’ criminal enterprise involved multiple types of scams, including romance fraud, pandemic-related relief fund fraud, unemployment insurance fraud, and business email compromise (BEC) schemes. These schemes disproportionately targeted elderly Americans, other vulnerable populations, and corporate entities across the United States, including in California, Illinois, Washington, Nevada, Puerto Rico, and Missouri.

The superseding indictment against the five defendants alleges that in 2020 and 2021, the group worked collaboratively to “clean” money obtained from fraudulent schemes. After acquiring funds from unsuspecting victims, they conducted hundreds of transactions to legitimize the proceeds. Among the notable activities attributed to the group was the purchase of used vehicles,........

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