A Nigerian man based in Abuja, Charles Uchenna Nwadavid, is facing up to 40 years in a United States prison and subsequent deportation for his alleged involvement in a $2.5 million romance scam, okaynews.com reports.
According to a statement released by the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ) on Wednesday, Nwadavid, 34, was apprehended on Monday, April 7, 2025, upon his arrival at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport on a flight from the United Kingdom. He appeared in federal court on Tuesday, April 8, 2025, and has been detained pending further proceedings in Boston, where he was indicted in January 2024 on charges of mail fraud and money laundering.
The DoJ statement alleges that between 2016 and September 2019, Nwadavid participated in romance scams that defrauded at least six victims of over $2.5 million. He is accused of deceiving these individuals into sending money overseas and then laundering the proceeds through cryptocurrency accounts he controlled.
To conceal his involvement, Nwadavid allegedly used a Massachusetts resident (referred to as Victim 1) to receive funds from five other victims across the United States. He then allegedly tricked Victim 1 into transferring her own money and the other victims’ funds to him via cryptocurrency transactions. The DoJ also claims that Nwadavid accessed Victim 1’s accounts from overseas to move the stolen money to his accounts on the online cryptocurrency platform, LocalBitcoins.
While emphasizing that Nwadavid is presumed innocent until proven guilty, the U.S. Department of Justice noted that if convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of 20 years imprisonment for each count of mail fraud and money laundering. The statement also indicated that Nwadavid would be subject to deportation from the United States upon completion of any prison sentence he may receive.
