A Nigerian man who allegedly conned an Australian pensioner out of $90,000 in an online dating scam has appeared in court charged with deception, the country’s anti-graft agency said on Thursday.
“The man was brought to court in Ibadan yesterday (Wednesday) for conspiracy and obtaining the sum of $90,000 from an Australian woman under false pretence,” Wilson Uwujaren, of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), told AFP.
He said Orowo Jesse Omokoh had met 67-year-old Jette Jacobs, a grandmother from Western Australia who lived in Johannesburg, South Africa, on the Internet in 2012 with a promise to marry her.
But the accused and others still at large then fraudulently obtained the money from the woman to prepare for the wedding in Nigeria which never took place.
“Jesse left Nigeria to meet the woman on February 4, 2013 and five days later, Jacobs was found dead in her apartment in Johannesburg,” he added.
Jesse returned to Nigeria two days after the discovery of Jacobs’ body but Uwujaren could not say if the accused was responsible for her death.
The defendant, who was arrested in Nigeria in January this year, pleaded not guilty to the charges and his lawyer asked the court to grant him bail.
But the court instead remanded him in custody until a further hearing of the bail application on July 10.
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