In relation to a Nigerian sextortion operation that resulted in the suicide death of a Michigan girl, five Americans have entered guilty pleas to money laundering charges.
Dinsimore Guyton Robinson, 29, of Alabama, and Kendall Ormond London, 32, of Georgia, Brian Keith Coldmon, Jr., 30; Jarell Daivon Williams, 31; and Jonathan Demetrius Green, 32, have entered guilty pleas to using online payment systems to collect sextortion proceeds and transfer them to a Nigerian person they called “The Plug,” according to a press release from the Justice Department.
Nigerian brothers Samuel Ogoshi, 22, and his brother Samson Ogoshi, 20, used a hacked Instagram account to masquerade as a woman and engage in communication with Jordan DeMay, 17, who was from Michigan.
In the end, the brothers utilized the account to intimidate the youngster into transferring more money and blackmail him into sending it till he committed suicide in March 2022.
In 2024, the Ogoshi brothers were extradited to the United States by federal officials, and a judge sentenced them to more than 17 years in jail and five years of supervised release for their involvement in the sextortion scheme that killed DeMay and targeted over 100 additional victims.
John DeMay, Jordan’s father, responded to the five Americans who entered guilty pleas to money laundering on Thursday by saying, “It’s rewarding in a sense that our country and the FBI are taking this seriously and closing the gaps on each leg of this crime.”
Between October 2021 and March 2023, the FBI received more than 13,000 reports of online financial sextortion involving at least 12,600 victims, indicating that sextortion is a trend in social media crime when criminals lure or encourage a minor to engage in sexual acts or transfer money for blackmail.
Under the guise of love interests, the Nigerian sextortionists in Jordan forced young men and boys to send nude photos.
As soon as they sent those pictures, the sextortionists threatened to reveal them if the victims didn’t pay them cash online.
Jordan, for instance, posted an explicit photo of himself to the account he believed to be that of a woman on the same evening that the Ogoshis began corresponding with him on Instagram.
Prosecutors claimed that if Jordan did not provide money right away, Samuel Ogoshi threatened to reveal it and make it “viral” online.
Jordan complied and sent the suspect money, but Samuel Ogoshi’s demands for more money from the 17-year-old only made the crime worse.
One night, after hours of conversation, Jordan finally told Samuel Ogoshi that he was going to end his own life.
“Good,” he stated. “Do that fast. Or I’ll make you do it. I swear to God.”
Jordan and other victims were instructed by the Ogoshi brothers to transfer the funds to accounts used by the Georgia and Alabama money launderers using Apple Pay, Cash App, and Zelle.
The money launderers would then keep around 20% of the money, convert the remaining amount to bitcoin, and transmit the bitcoin to “The Plug” in Nigeria.
Additionally, “The Plug” transferred the remaining money to the sextortionists, in this case the Ogoshi brothers, while keeping some for himself.
According to DeMay, scammers choose bitcoin since it is more difficult to convert US dollars into Nigerian cash and is more difficult for authorities to track down.
The Americans who “profited from this awful, heartbreaking scheme” will now “face the consequences” of their crimes, according to Acting U.S. Attorney Birge.
“The conspiracy offense is punishable by up to 20 years in prison. The court will decide the sentences upon consultation with federal sentencing guidelines and the individual circumstances,” Birge stated.
Since then, DeMay has used his pain to advocate for federal laws that would safeguard children online and to teach Americans about sextortion and how to keep kids safe from these frauds. He has done this by touring both domestically and abroad.
Although any youngster can become a victim, the FBI stated in a news release earlier this year that the typical age of sextortion victims is between 14 and 17.
The FBI reports that most offenders of financially motivated sextortion come from Southeast Asian and African nations. Additionally, the FBI reported a 20% rise in child sextortion cases from October 2022 to March 2023.
Suicide and self-harm are two outcomes of sextortion. Boys made up the bulk of victims of online money extortion between October 2021 and March 2023. According to the FBI, these reports included at least 20 suicides.
This information has been sourced from Fox News.
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