According to the Police in Singapore, two Yoruba boys have on Tuesday arrested and charged to court in the Asian country after being caught in an alleged Internet love scam.
They were caught while recruiting local women to collect money for them, police said.
Such scams, where victims part with cash after a fraudster feigns romantic interest in them, are a growing concern in the city-state with police reporting 660 cases last year.
The Nigerians – identified in local news reports as Oladayo Opeyemi Awolola, 34, and Gbolahan Ayobami Awolola, 37 – were arrested by Malaysian authorities in Kuala Lumpur last month and sent to Singapore on Monday.
The men allegedly recruited two Singaporean women “as money mules to receive criminal proceeds linked to internet love scams in Singapore” between 2017 and 2018, according to a police statement.
The women received $85,700 Singapore dollars ($63,000) during that period and turned the money over to syndicate members in Malaysia, police said.
The Nigerians could be jailed for up to five years each and fined if convicted.
It is the first time that suspects based overseas and involved in internet love scams have been arrested and sent to Singapore for prosecution, police said.
Most of the internet love scams reported last year in the city-state involved fraudsters claiming to have sent parcels containing luxury items or money.
Their local accomplices would call the “recipients” and claim the parcels were being held by the authorities for inspection, and would only be released if they transferred money to a bank account.
Meanwhile, A High Court in Ilorin, on Tuesday, sentenced two brothers, Seun and Abidemi Olaogun and their friend, Ojor Alex to four months in prison for internet fraud.
The sentence followed a plea bargain agreement entered by the convicts with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), NAN reports.
Omewa said sometime in March, the convicts agreed among themselves to do an illegal act to wit, cheating by impersonation.
“They pretended to be one Ava Coles, a white Caucasians female, with a Gmail account, ava.coles700@gmail.com
“And pretended to be one Rox Anneanne, a white Caucasian female, with a Gmail account, roxanneanne147@gmail.com,” he said.
The prosecutor said that the convicts committed the offence contrary to sections 95 and 321 of the penal code law and punishable under section 324 of the same law.