US Court convicts Nigerian Olusegun Adejorin of $7.5m fraud

A United States court has convicted 32-year-old Nigerian national Olusegun Adejorin of wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and unauthorised access to a protected computer.

Adejorin, who was extradited from Ghana to face trial, was found guilty of a scheme that defrauded two charitable organisations in the United States between June and August 2020. Prosecutors told the court that the fraud targeted a Maryland-based charity providing investment services to other organisations.

According to a statement by the US Attorney-General’s Office in the District of Maryland, Adejorin also defrauded a New York-based charity by gaining access to employee email accounts and impersonating staff to induce financial transactions.

The Fraud Scheme

Prosecutors explained that Adejorin registered spoofed domain names to impersonate employees of the New York charity. He used this deception to request withdrawals of funds from the Maryland charity, fraudulently transferring over $7.5 million to accounts not belonging to the New York organisation.

“He ultimately caused more than $7.5 million of Victim 2’s (New York-based charity) funds to be sent, pursuant to the fraudulent withdrawal requests, from Victim 1 (Maryland-based charity) to bank accounts that were not Victim 2’s bank accounts,” the statement read.

Adejorin faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison for each of the five counts of wire fraud, five years for unauthorised access to a protected computer, and a mandatory two-year consecutive term for aggravated identity theft. Actual sentences are usually lower, with the final term determined by a federal district judge under US sentencing guidelines.

US Attorney Kelly Hayes commended the FBI for its investigative work. US District Judge Theodore Chuang is scheduled to deliver Adejorin’s sentence on April 10, 2026.