Wire fraud convict, Obinwanne Okeke, widely known as Invictus Obi, has lost the appeal he filed against his years’ imprisonment.
The U.S. Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal after it was voluntarily withdrawn by the convict.
The 33-year-old Nigerian, who was arrested in the U.S. on August 6, 2019, had pleaded guilty to the offence of conspiracy to commit wire fraud last year June.
U.S. authorities said victims lost nearly $11million to the large-scale fraud perpetrated through global business email and computer hacking schemes between 2015 and 2019.
Okeke, formerly celebrated internationally as a successful young African entrepreneur, was sentenced to 120 months’ imprisonment by a court in the Eastern District of Virginia on February 16.
A judge, Rebecca Smith, also ordered him to restitute about $10.7million proceeds of his fraud to the U.S. government.
The minutes of the sentencing proceedings indicated that Okeke was notified of his right of appeal, but waived it in his plea agreement with U.S. authorities.
Despite that the convict filed his notice of appeal against the sentence on Tuesday.
Okeke was celebrated by Forbes African magazine as one of the 30 under-30 successful entrepreneurs on the continent in 2016, when he was only 28.
He operated his Invictus Group which he claimed had investments in oil and gas, real estate, agriculture, among others in Nigeria, South Africa and Zambia.
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) operatives arrested him on August 6, 2019, on a criminal complaint for computer and wire fraud to defraud Unatrac Holding Limited, which is headquartered in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
He was arrested at Dulles International Airport, Virginia, as he prepared to depart the U.S. after a visit to witness the birth of his then less-than-a-month-old daughter born on July 15, 2019.
The entrepreneur, who holds masters degree in International Business and Counter-terrorism from Monash University, Australia, was charged with two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit computer fraud.
He initially denied the charges, but later entered into a plea bargain agreement with the U.S authorities and pleaded guilty to Count 1 on June 18, 2020.
The second count of computer fraud, with lesser penalty, was dropped as part of the plea agreement.
The judge, Smith, sentenced him to 10 years’ imprisonment on February 16, and issued restitution and forfeiture orders against him.
The judge also ordered him to undergo three years of supervised release after completing his jail term.
He is prohibited from taking up jobs that grant access to money and bank accounts or hold positions involving investments if he will undergo the supervised release in the U.S.
Freelanews is the editorial byline of Freelanews.com, used for staff reports, news updates, press releases, and collaborative stories produced by the Freelanews Editorial Team.
