Monday, April 7, 2025 - Three men including two Nigerians, Imafedia Adevokhai and Osazuwa Peter Okunoghae, have been sentenced to US federal prison for their roles in a tax refund fraud scheme.
The Acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Texas,
Abe McGlothin, Jr. announced this in a statement obtained on Sunday, April 6.
Imafedia Adevokhai, 47, of Alpharetta, Georgia, pleaded
guilty to money laundering on February 15, 2023, and was sentenced to 46 months
in federal prison by U.S. District Judge Robert W. Schroeder, III on April 2,
2025. Adevokhai was ordered to pay $90,380.60 in restitution and $3500 in
forfeiture.
Michael Martin, 52, of Texarkana, Texas, pleaded guilty to
conspiracy on February 14, 2023, and was sentenced to 18 months in federal
prison by Judge Schroeder on November 21, 2023. Martin was ordered to pay
$90,380.60 in restitution and $121,623.41 in forfeiture.
Osazuwa Peter Okunoghae, 46, of Houston, pleaded guilty to
money laundering conspiracy on November 12, 2019, and was sentenced to 78
months in federal prison by Judge Schroeder on January 13, 2022. Okunoghae was
ordered to pay $451,117.63 in restitution and $451,117.63 in forfeiture.
"The Eastern District of Texas is committed to
prosecuting individuals who participate in schemes to steal personal
information, prepare and file fraudulent tax returns, and launder the
proceeds,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Abe McGlothin, Jr. “Crimes like these
affect all of us, the individual victims whose identities are stolen and used
to file fraudulent tax returns, the taxpayers, who are left with the bill, and
our financial institutions, which are manipulated and misused to launder the
proceeds.”
“Adevokhai, Martin, and Okunoghae, along with others,
created a complex scheme to steal the tax refunds of law-abiding U.S. taxpayers
through stolen identity refund fraud,” said Christopher J. Altemus Jr., special
agent in charge of the IRS Criminal Investigation’s Dallas Field Office.
“The women and men of IRS-CI did an outstanding job of
uncovering this fraudulent activity and bringing the individuals to justice.
Their sentences should be a warning to anyone who would try to defraud the U.S.
Government or prey on law-abiding taxpayers.”
According to information presented in court, Adevokhai,
Martin, Okunoghae, and others were involved in a multi-year stolen identity
refund fraud (SIRF) conspiracy involving the theft of victims’ personal
identifying information and the use of the stolen information to file
fraudulent tax returns.
The total tax refunds claimed by the fraudulent returns
was $4,945,886, and the U.S. Department of Treasury, Internal Revenue Service,
suffered at least a $390,220.40 loss.
Adevokhai was involved in the preparation and filing of many
of the fraudulent tax returns. Okunoghae and Martin were involved in the
laundering of the stolen funds. To that end, they worked together and with
others who would transfer fraud proceeds through United States financial
accounts and ultimately to foreign financial accounts. The investigation
connected Adevokhai, Martin, and Okunoghae to dozens of victims whose taxpayer
identities were stolen.
In January 2019, individuals from three states and other
individuals from Nigeria were charged for their roles in the conspiracy.
One of the Department of Justice Tax Division’s top
priorities is prosecuting individuals who use stolen identities to steal money
from the United States Treasury by filing fraudulent tax returns. SIRF schemes
threaten to disrupt the orderly administration of the income tax system for
law-abiding taxpayers and have cost the United States Treasury billions of
dollars.
The case was investigated by the Internal Revenue
Service-Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) and prosecuted by Assistant U.S.
Attorneys Nathaniel C. Kummerfeld and Sean Taylor.
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