A judgment debtor, Bamise Ajetunmobi, who is believed to have scammed over 27 aggrieved Nigerian investors in a failed Ponzi scheme has told a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos today that he is interested in an out of court settlement regarding a N15 billion fraud, which he’s facing before the court.
Ajetunmobi and his company, Imagine Global Solution Limited, are being tried before the court by the Office of the Attorney General of the Federation on an amended 35 count charge of conspiracy and obtaining the sum of N15bn.
On July 14, 2022, Justice Toyin Oyekan-Abdullahi (now retired) of the Lagos High Court sitting in Osborne, Ikoyi had delivered judgment in favour of the 27 aggrieved Nigerian investors/claimants and ordered Bamise and his wife, Elizabeth Ajetunmobi who allegedly fled the country after duping them to pay back to the investors the sum of N18.8bn with interest. The court had also frozen funds and properties of the defendants worldwide as well as all monies standing to their credit.
The whereabouts of the couple remained unknown after the Lagos Court granted the order but following reports that Bamise was arrested in Côte d’Ivoire while trying to board a flight to the UK, he was returned to Nigeria and handed over to the police who subsequently detained him at the Force Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (FCIID) Alagbon, Lagos.
The FCIID, through one of its legal officers, Morufu Animashaun, obtained a remand warrant against the defendant, but before his arraignment by the police, his case file was taken over by the AGF’s office, who subsequently arraigned the defendant before the court on August 12, 2023. His wife is said to still be at large.
At his arraignment before Justice Chukwujekwu Aneke, he denied the offence and pleaded not guilty to all the counts of the charge.
Justice Aneke while ruling on his bail application held “that the prosecutor had made a credible submission that the defendant is a ‘flight risk’, as he was arrested by the interpol at Ivory Coast, but bail is his constitutional rights.”
The judge consequently ordered the defendant to deposit the sum of N5 billion to the Deputy Registrar of the Court and to also deposit his international traveling passport with the court.
He has since been in the custody of the Nigerian Correctional Services, owing to his inability to produce the N5 billion bail sum and other terms granted him by the court.
At the resumed trial of the defendant today, his lawyer, Dr. BU Ukpenna, informed the court that he had written a letter to the office of the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) to seek for an out of court settlement of the matter.
The prosecutor, Mrs. Kehinde Bode-Ayeni, after receiving a copy of the letter, asked the court for a short date, to enable the prosecution get the approval of the AGF.
By the consent of the parties, the matter was adjourned to June 26, for report of settlement.
The prosecutor, Mrs. Bode-Ayeni, an Assistant Chief State Counsel, while arraigning the defendant, told the court that the defendant committed the alleged offences between February 2018 to December 2022, at his office complex located at plot 29a, Adebisi Ogunniyi Crescent, Lekki Phase 1, Lagos.
Among those allegedly defrauded by the defendant and the amounts he defrauded them according to the prosecutor were: Abioye Idiris, N3. 5 billion; Chikezie Nowokocha (April Breakthrough Ventures) N1. 760,740 billion; Edith Agu and her three friends, N236,500 million; and Mr. Peter Okonye and his wife, Mrs. Thelma Okonye, N1. 2 billion, and 31 others.
She told the court that the alleged offences contravened sections 8(a) and 1(1)(a) of the advance fee fraud and other fraud related offences Act, 2006 and punishable under Section 8 and 8 read in conjunction with section 1(3) of the same Act.
Some of the charges against the defendant reads: “That you, Imagine Global Solutions Ltd of Plot 29(a), Adebisi Ogunniyi Crescent, Lekki Phase 1, Lagos, Lagos State, Bamise Samson Ajetunmobi ‘M’, the Managing Director of Imagine Global Solutions Ltd and others (now at large), sometimes in December, 2018 and 2022, at Lagos, Lagos State, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, while acting as investors, did, with the intent to defraud, obtained a total sum of N3,500,000,000.00 (Three Billion five hundred Million Naira) at different times, from Abioye Idiris on the pretext that you were going to invest the money for him and remit some percentage of the total sum to him on monthly basis as interest while the principal sum would be returned to him in full at the end of the tenure, a representation which you knew to be false and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1(1)(a) of the Advance fee fraud and other Related Offences Act, 2006 and punishable under Section 1(3) of the same Act.
“That you, Imagine Global Solutions Ltd of Plot 29(a), Adebisi Ogunniyi Crescent, Lekki Phase 1, Lagos, Lagos State, Bamise Samson Ajetunmobi ‘M’, the Managing Director of Imagine Global Solutions Ltd and others (now at large), sometimes between December 2020 and July, 2021, at Lagos, Lagos State, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, while acting as investors, did, with the intent to defraud, obtained a total sum of N1,760,740,000.00(One Billion, Seven Hundred and Sixty Million, Seven hundred and Forty thousand Naira) at different times, from Chikezie Nowokocha (April Breakthrough Ventures), on the pretext that you were going to invest the money for him and remit some percentage of the total sum to him on monthly basis as interest, while the principal sum would be returned to him in full at the end of the tenure, a representation which you knew to be false and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1(1)(a) of the Advance fee fraud and other Related Offences Act, 2006 and punishable under Section 1(3) of the same Act.
“That you, Imagine Global Solutions Ltd of Plot 29(a), Adebisi Ogunniyi Crescent, Lekki Phase 1, Lagos, Lagos State, Bamise Samson Ajetunmobi ‘M’, the Managing Director of Imagine Global Solutions Ltd and others (now at large),sometimes between the period of April, to September, 2021, at Lagos, Lagos State, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, while acting as investors, did, with the intent to defraud, obtained a total sum of N236, 500, 000.00 (two hundred and thirty six million, five hundred thousand Naira) at different times, from Edith Agu and her three friends, on the pretext that you were going to invest the money for them and remit some percentage of the money to them as ‘interest’ monthly, while the principal sum would be returned to them in full at the end of the tenure, a representation which you knew to be false and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1(1)(a) of the Advance fee fraud and other Related Offences Act, 2006 and punishable under Section 1(3) of the same Act.
“That you, Imagine Global Solutions Ltd of Plot 29(a), Adebisi Ogunniyi Crescent, Lekki Phase 1, Lagos, Lagos State, Bamise Samson Ajetunmobi ‘M’, the Managing Director of Imagine Global Solutions Ltd and others (now at large), sometimes between December 2020 and July, 2021, at Lagos, Lagos State, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, while acting as investors, did, with the intent to defraud, obtained a total sum of N1, 200, 000, 000. 00 (one billion, two hundred million Naira) at different times, from Mr. Peter Okonye, his wife, Mrs. Thelma Okonye and others, on the pretext that you were going to invest the money for them and remit some percentage of the money to them as interest monthly, while the principal sum would be returned to them on maturity or end of the tenure, a representation which you knew to be false and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1 (1)(a) of the Advance fee fraud and other Related Offences Act, 2006 and punishable under Section 1 (3) of the same Act.”