The ringleader, Wisdom Oghenekaro Onyobeno, 44, was sentenced Tuesday to more than 10 years in federal prison.
Onyobeno, who until his arrest in 2019 was living in Sandy Springs, Ga., pleaded for forgiveness from the victims and mercy from US District Court Judge John J. McConnell Jr.
His voice cracking at times, Onyobeno said he would never have done this to his own parents or family, who have since turned against him. He said his children didn’t know he has been held at the Wyatt Detention Center in Central Falls since his arrest. “I am promising, your honor, if our paths cross again, it could be good,” Onyobeno said to the judge, arguing for his release. “You could be proud to say, ‘I gave him a second chance and he did well.’”
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But several of the victims and their daughters described to the judge the devastation that Onyobeno and his co-conspirators wrought on their lives. They lost thousands, retirement money, valuables, and, in some cases, ended up needing public assistance to survive.
McConnell handed down a sentence that was the lengthiest of all of Onyobeno’s co-conspirators.
“These women will never be repaid. I can’t restore their goodness. I can’t restore their heart, their loving character, their charity, I can’t restore that to them. And I can’t even give them justice, because I know they’ll never be paid back,” McConnell said. “But I can consider all that in saying that a guideline sentence of 121 months is appropriate.”
Onyobeno’s incarceration will be followed by three years of federal supervised release. Restitution will be determined by the court at a later date.
Federal authorities said Onyobeno was the ringleader of a network of people involved in the romance fraud scheme and money laundering, a scheme that spread across the United States and overseas, including in Nigeria. Other co-conspirators have already been sentenced in the case. Prosecutors said Onyobeno was involved with the romance scams, even meeting one woman in person, and money laundering.
“It was a well-thought-out, smart, intricate operation, but at its core, it was nothing but a two-bit fraud on innocent people,” McConnell said.
A Florida woman, who was 71 and a widow when Onyobeno and his group reached her, said she was a trusting, devout Christian who was lonely after the death of her husband of 49 years. She wanted to find romance and sought connection online, but was bilked out of more than $324,000.
“Psychologically this has caused me times of severe depression due to lack of finances and loneliness. I do not sleep well at all,” she said, over Zoom, while waiting anxiously in her home for the approach of Hurricane Milton. “I have spent many evenings in tears, because I feel my life is so out of control.”
A woman whose late mother was taken in by the con said she wanted Onyobeno to serve a lengthy sentence and then be deported.
“My family has anguished,” she said. “He didn’t care about my mom or how she felt, or what he was doing to her. He came to this country to scam and take advantage of the vulnerable.”
This investigation began in 2018, after a 76-year-old widow from South Kingstown was taken in by a fictitious “General Mathew Weyer,” who she met online on Words with Friends. He claimed to be stationed with the US Army in Afghanistan. The stories she was fed by the fake general led her to refinance her home, sell another home she owned in Massachusetts. She withdrew money, over time sending more than $1.4 million to individuals and entities throughout the United States, including $660,000 to accounts controlled by members of the conspiracy, according to court records.
As of April 2019, an investigation by the US Attorney’s Office and US Postal Inspection Service found that 28 individuals in more than a dozen states had fallen victim to the scams employed by Onyobeno and others in his conspiracy, according to court documents.
“The victims are smart. They are educated. They are kind. They are not foolish women. They were conned,” Assistant United States Attorney Denise M. Barton said.
Onyobeno and others in his ring created false personas and used social media platforms such as Words With Friends and online dating sites including Plenty of Fish, Christian Mingle, and Our Time to befriend older women and groom them.
Then they created different stories. They claimed to be military members stationed overseas who needed funds to send their belongings home or to travel back to the US. They claimed to be US contractors stuck on oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. As the victims sent money to post office boxes or wired money to bank accounts managed by Onyobeno and others, the desperate claims increased in urgency, with the conspirators posing as government officials or even children of the correspondents — prompting victims to send more money to help.
The money landed in bank accounts for business entities used to launder money. As banks got suspicious and closed the accounts, Onyobeno and his conspirators would just open new ones, like a game of “Whack a Mole,” Barton said.
Even as some of his co-conspirators were being arrested, Onyobeno continued perpetuating the fraud right up until he was arrested, she said.
Onyobeno pleaded guilty on April 28, 2023, to charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering, and wire fraud.
His lawyer, Michael Lepizzera of Warwick, argued that Onyobeno had already been incarcerated at Wyatt Detention Center for nearly five years awaiting trial, so there was no need for a longer sentence. He also argued that Onyobeno wasn’t the lead organizer in the conspiracy, and shouldn’t serve longer than the other defendants. One, Dominique Golden, was sentenced by the US District Court of Rhode Island to 78 months in prison, and was also prosecuted and sentenced to 54 months in the Northern District of Georgia.
he judge said the victims had paid the price for his crimes.
“What makes it so serious a crime to me is it preyed on peoples’ goodness. It preyed on their charity. It preyed on their heart,” McConnell said. “It preyed on the love that they had for another person in the situation that they found themselves in, and that ripped out all of the goodness that these people had.”
Amanda Milkovits can be reached at amanda.milkovits@globe.com. Follow her @AmandaMilkovits.
