How fraudsters duped pastor of N4.5 million

A four-man gang of fraudsters Chuks Anorebe, Adekunle Thomas, Thomas Bens and Yakubu Lawal real name Ramoni Raji have been busted by the the operatives of the Special.

The suspects: Chucks, Bens, Raji and Thomas Anti Robbery Squad of Lagos State Police Command, led by Abba Kyari, a Superintendent of Police (SP). Anorebe specialises in ‘catching’ the victims while Adekunle acts as ‘the solution man’, Thomas Bens plays the role of a foreign based businessman and Lawal aka, a fake 

Customs Officer pretends that he will facilitate clearing of bogus cargo. The syndicate specialises in duping unsuspecting members of the public and had allegedly duped a Pastor from the South Eastern part of the country after luring him to Lagos for a non existing business transaction.

The fraud was perpetrated some weeks back, though the pastor had gone back to the East without reporting the matter to the police. However, the bubble burst and the gang was arrested for duping one Mrs. Uche, a Lagos based business woman to the tune of N800, 000 and threatened to kill her if she exposed them. It was upon their arrest that they also confessed to the swindling the pastor.

Investigations by the Lagos Police Command revealed that one Ifeanyi who is still at large contracted the job to the syndicate. It was gathered that Ifeanyi called Chukwuka on phone for  the job and  they called the victim, a pastor from the East and coaxed  him into a bogus business proposal and at the end, defrauded him N4.3 Million.

Investigation revealed that Bens hacked into a foreign number and called victim based on information they had got from an inside that the pastor had large parcels of land to dispose of. The pastor it was gathered came to Lagos twice by air and lodged in a hotel near Stop Over Hotel at Airport Road, Ajao Estate.

In his confession, Chuks Anierobi, said “I am from Awkuju, I am 52 yrs. I live at 38/34 Alafia Street, Shasha, Akowonjo. I am a trader in textile materials. I bring textile materials from Ikorodu to my house to sell and supply or give my wife to supply. Thomas Bens is my long time friend we belong to Upper one Club. One Ifeanyi in Onitsha called me. His master Okechukwu, now late was the one I know that was how he got my number and discussed the business with me. I sat down only once with him during the burial of Okechukwu. He called and told me that somebody want to sell a property, that we should work on him.”

According to 50 years old Tom Bens from Ogbaru in Anambra State, “I sold okirika in Cotonou before. 

Theman told Chuks that he has a land and work to do. I am the person who pretended to be the  buyer who reside abroad, I gave my name in that business as Tony  speaking from London. He told me the price of the land and I told him I will send him the money and the investment will start. I told him l want to build secondary school,  he said that it was 105 plots of land. The total value is about N210Million.

“I told him that I was sending 3million dollars to him. That I will send it by cargo through air. When he said l should pay through the bank to his account, I told him no that l was avoiding EFCC because of money laundry law. We did the negotiation for one week, this is where Ramoni the false customs officer came  in as a clearing agent who will clear the money for him. We know Ramoni through Adekunle Thomas.

On his part, Ramoni Raji said the group approached him through Adekunle Thomas and “I told them I will do the role of clearing the box of money which we pretended  was sent through Air France. But the box containing pieces of papers, it was by word of mouth I called the man that the luggage, his money had arrived. The man came down and told me that he lodged in a hotel at Airport Road. I met him there and  I told him about the money for clearing. He said the sender of the money had already told him the price for clearing which is N870,000. So, after, I told him that  they (customs) wants  to open the box at NACO. He said I should not allow them to open it. I told him the customs people want to collect N5 Million. He told me to beat the price down, so he agreed to pay N3.5 Million.

He said he and his wife are operating  join account, that he will go back to the East and sign a cheque  with his wife and come to Airport Road to withdraw N3.5Million and pay me. We prepared packed papers inside the box and I gave it to him the following day when he came by the flight. The man is a pastor.

In the midnight around 2a.m., he called and said Yakubu, thank you for defrauding mewith your gang, you put papers in a box and said it was money. That was three weeks ago.

Five of us shared N700,000 each. This matter was closed but it was Uche that came to report us to the police. It was when they arrested us that Adekunle Thomas revealed to the police about the pastors business.

Adekunle Thomas, “my role was to finish the job. There is instruction on the box. The victim will call me to come and assist in clearing the defaced notes. But when he found out we are fraudster after we collected the initial money,  he was interested again.

So when I was arrested l thought it was on the account of the pastor’s business not knowing it was on Mrs. Uche’s business which we have succeeded and forgotten about.