Nigerian Sentenced to 87 Months in US Prison Over $1.7m Money-Laundering Scheme

A Nigerian citizen and US permanent resident has been sentenced to 87 months in federal prison for his role in a money-laundering operation involving approximately $1.7 million in proceeds from multiple fraud schemes in the United States.

Adedayo Fateru was sentenced alongside three other defendants following an investigation by the US Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation and the US Postal Inspection Service. The US Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of North Carolina announced the sentences on August 5.

According to US prosecutors, Fateru worked with Lisa Farrow, William Atwater and Victoria Stone to move and conceal money generated through several fraudulent schemes. The operation involved business email compromises, modified cheque schemes, fraudulent Automated Clearing House transactions and false applications for COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loans and unemployment benefits.

Court documents described a network in which bank accounts were opened to receive money obtained through the various fraud schemes before funds were withdrawn or transferred in ways prosecutors said were designed to conceal their origins.

Stone, for example, opened 10 bank accounts and received approximately $1.04 million in fraudulent proceeds. Prosecutors said she withdrew about $187,375 through hundreds of transactions, including ATM withdrawals and debit-card cash advances.

Atwater received approximately $704,320 through bank accounts he opened and subsequently withdrew or transferred about $390,352 through more than 150 transactions, according to the Justice Department.

The sentences handed down to the other defendants were also substantial. Farrow received 45 months in prison, Atwater was sentenced to 33 months, while Stone received 25 months. Collectively, the four defendants received 190 months of imprisonment.

Fateru's sentence will be followed by three years of supervised release, but his legal situation in the United States will not end when his prison term does. The Justice Department said he will be transferred to the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) after completing his sentence, where he will face removal proceedings under US immigration law.

The case highlights the increasingly sophisticated nature of financial fraud investigations in the United States. Rather than focusing only on the people who initially obtain money through fraudulent transactions, investigators are increasingly tracing the networks that receive, move and disguise those proceeds.

It also demonstrates how apparently separate fraud schemes can become connected through the financial trails they leave behind. Business email compromises, fraudulent government-benefit applications and manipulated payment transactions may begin as different crimes, but once the proceeds enter a coordinated laundering network, investigators can follow the movement of money across accounts and transactions.

For Fateru, that trail has now ended in a federal prison sentence and the prospect of immigration proceedings after his release.

The case is another reminder that US authorities are increasingly pursuing not only those who generate fraudulent proceeds, but also the financial networks used to make illegally obtained money harder to trace.