Court Jails Lagos Musician Over Romance Scam

One Richard Uomo Endurance, a musician, has been jailed for six months over his involvement in an internet love scam.

The 30-year-old was convicted and sentenced by a La­gos State Ikeja Special Offences Court on Monday.

The presiding judge, Justice Ramon Oshodi, convicted the de­fendant, Endurance, following his plea of guilt after he was docked on a lone count charge of possession of fraudulent doc­uments.

The defendant who claims to be a musician was charged be­fore the court after his arrest in December by operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

The defendant pleaded guilty to the lone charge preferred against him before the court bor­dering on possession of fraudu­lent documents. He agreed to the fact that he opted to plead guilty to the charge in a plea bargain arrangement.

Prosecuting counsel, Ayanfe Adeahina, informed the court that the anti-graft agency re­ceived an anonymous complaint the defendant and others were living large without any legiti­mate means of livelihood.

He said surveillance was car­ried out to confirm and verify the complainant.

“Based on that a raid was conducted and the defendant and others were arrested by the EFCC around Lekki Palm Estate, Ajah, Lagos,” he said.

The prosecutor added that upon his arrest, he was found with an IPhone 11 Pro Max and one HP laptop; his email and phones were analysed and sev­eral documents were found.

Further investigation re­vealed that he has several emails containing romance scams one of which he falsely represented himself to be Jack Selver, a white male from a dating site. The de­fendant was interviewed and he made a voluntary statement where he confirmed engaging in a dating scam for which he has in his procession various docu­ments which are false.

“Subsequently he was charged to court but he ap­proached the commission through his counsel,” he said.

He, however, prayed the court to convict the defendant accord­ingly.

While sentencing the defen­dant, the judge said the defen­dant is very much aware of the nature of the amended charge presented before the court.

“He admitted and plead guilty, thereby entering into the guilty plea voluntarily. Following your guilty plea and admission of the crime, I hereby convict you Richard Endurance Utomo. I have listened to your plea for le­niency, I am convinced that you are a first-time offender who has not benefited from the proceeds of the fraud. I see that you are generally repentant. I do agree that a minimum sentence should be applied.