The Ilorin zonal command of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), on Friday, secured conviction of five persons over internet fraud-related offences before Justice Adenike Akinpelu and Mahmoud Abdulgafar of the Kwara State High Court, Ilorin.
A statement by the Head, Media and Publicity of the anti-graft agency, Dele Oyewale, gave names of the convicts as Oyedepo Olamilekan Benjamin from Omu-Aran in the Irepodun local government area of Kwara state, Suleiman Saheed Olayinka from the Ilorin in Ilorin South local government area of Kwara state, Fakeye Tolulope Emmanuel from Ila-Orangun in Osun state, Great Ukueni from the Jesse local government area of Delta state and Adeshina Joseph Oluwaseun from Ogbomosho, Oyo.
The convicts, who were prosecuted on separate counts before the Justices pleaded guilty to their respective charges.
Upon the guilty pleas, the prosecuting counsel, Andrew Akoja, Mustapha Kaigama and Isabel Adeniran, narrated the circumstances that led to the arrest of the defendants. They urged the court to consider the plea of the defendants, the extra-judicial statements and all the exhibits tendered to convict the defendants as charged.
Justice Akinpelu in her judgment sentenced Oyedepo to six months imprisonment with an option of fine of N150,000 and ordered the forfeiture of one Apple iPhone X; HP laptop and the sum of $457 benefited from the unlawful activities to the Federal Government.
The Judge also sentenced Suleiman to six months imprisonment with an option of N100,000 and ordered that one Samsung A03 phone recovered from the convict be forfeited to the Federal Government.
Justice Akinpelu equally sentenced Fakeye to six months imprisonment on count 1 and 2 with option of N100,000 on each count and ordered that the sum of $400, one phone and HP laptop belonging to the convict be forfeited to the Federal Government.
On the other hand, Justice Abdulgafar sentenced Great to six months imprisonment which is to be suspended and ordered the forfeiture of one Dell Laptop used as an instrument of crime by the convict.
The court also sentenced Adesina to six months imprisonment with an option of fine of N100,000 and ordered the forfeiture of one iphone 13 promax and sum of $250 recovered from the convict.
