The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has recovered five mobile phones from a convict, Ikechukwu Ogbu, in Kirikiri Maximum Prison in the course of investigating him for another N12 million fraud he alleged perpetrated from the prison.
The prisoner was reportedly prosecuted by the commission over an advance fee fraud case in 2008 and sentenced to a 15-year imprisonment.
Commission’s spokesperson, Mr Femi Babafemi, disclosed that Ogbu right from his prison cell, the convict defrauded a banker to the tune of N12 million, using a love line in a national newspapers.
According to Babafemi, “the prisoner, Ikechuwku Ogbu, alias Prince Eze, investigations revealed, created a 419 syndicate from inside the inner recesses of the Kirikiri Prison, with which he had been duping unsuspecting members of the public. His method is what is known in advance fee fraud as love scam. He advertises himself as an eligible bachelor who desperately needs a wife.
“Those who respond to his adverts end up adding to the long list of his victims. However, the riddle which EFCC operatives are trying to resolve is how a supposed prison inmate managed to place an advertorial in the love links page of the Vanguard Newspapers of March 7, 2009. In the advertorial, Ogbu wrote: “I am Prince Eze, 46, from Anambra State, lives in Lagos. Genotype AA, Blood Group 0, needs a working class business lady between 39-45 to settle down with on 07057928637 or 07085350598.” Several women that were desperately looking for husband called these numbers.
“One of them is a lady who works with the National Assembly in Abuja. After making contact with her proposed spouse, she hopped into the next available flight to Lagos, to ensure that others don’t beat her to her prospective husband.”
