Two British-Nigerian men sentenced over multimillion-dollar business email scam

Fraudsters targeted local government, colleges, and construction firms in Texas and North Carolina

Two British-Nigerian men were sentenced for serious business email compromise schemes in the US this week, netting them millions of dollars from local government entities, construction companies, and colleges.

Oludayo Kolawole John Adeagbo, 45, was sentenced to seven years in prison for fraud campaigns affecting organizations in Texas and North Carolina. He was assisted in the latter scheme by Donald Ikenna Echeazu, 42, who was sentenced to 18 months in prison and ordered to pay $655,408.87 in restitution.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) didn't name the university that was defrauded in North Carolina. Various local media reports from 2022, when Adeagbo was first extradited to the US from the UK, suggest it was Appalachian State.

Together, Adeagbo and Echeazu spent around six months between 2016 and 2017 setting up the scam, which raked in $1.9 million.

Court documents showed that the pair happened upon information related to high-value construction projects at the university and capitalized on it. They knew that large, relatively regular payments would be made as part of the ongoing works and targeted university staff, tricking them into sending a payment to the fraudsters instead of the contractor.

Adeagbo and Echeazu were said to be assisted in the scheme by others, who were not named. They registered a domain similar to that of a legitimate construction company that headed up the project and an email sent to the university from that domain was enough for the hefty sum to arrive in the criminals' accounts, which was then promptly laundered.

"As a North Carolina university planned for growth with a new construction project, Adeagbo worked on a scheme to defraud the school by stealing nearly two million dollars of its funding," said Robert M DeWitt, special agent in charge of the FBI Charlotte Field Office.

"When he and his conspirators first committed this BEC [business email compromise] more than seven years ago, they likely never expected to get caught. This federal prison sentence shows the FBI will do everything possible to find and hold international financial fraudsters accountable."

Over in Texas, between November 2016 and July 2018, multiple BEC frauds were carried out, earning Adeagbo and his unnamed accomplices more than $3 million.

Construction companies were again among the victims, as were local government entities and a college also based in Houston.

While none of the victims were identified, local reporters at the Houston Chronicle claimed that one of the local governments was Galveston County, defrauded for more than half a million dollars after Adeagbo posed as a Houston road works company. Another $888,000 scam reportedly aligned with a similar case in Harris County, which tasked D&W Contractors with repairing a parking lot.

The publication further claimed that Adeagbo posed as the Houston-based Tellepsen Group, another construction company that just so happened to be contracted by the West Houston Institute community college.

Tactics alike the North Carolina cyber heist were used, the DOJ said. They registered domain names similar to those of clients or customers of the victim organizations and preyed on unwitting staff to order seemingly routine payments to their own accounts.

"Oludayo Adeagbo thought he was pretty slick stealing other people's money via this scam. His victims, however, strongly disagreed," said Michael Nordwall, executive assistant director at the FBI. 

"Instead of enjoying the fruits of his illegal labors, Adeagbo will now be spending time in a federal prison. The BEC is one of the fastest growing and most costly scams and the only way to fight it is through cooperation, often international cooperation, and this case is a prime example of partnerships working."

"BEC schemes, like the ones perpetrated by Adeagbo and his co-conspirators, are sophisticated and devastating crimes that target the trust businesses and institutions place in their daily operations," said Dena J King, US attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. 

"By exploiting this trust, fraudsters steal millions of dollars from unsuspecting victims. This case demonstrates the commitment of my office and our law enforcement partners to pursue justice for those impacted by these schemes and to hold cybercriminals accountable, regardless of where they are operating from."

Adeagbo will serve one year of supervised release following his seven-year prison stint and was ordered to repay $942,655.03 in restitution. ®