A United States court has sentenced a Nigerian national identified as Tochukwu Albert Nnebocha to eight years’ imprisonment for participating in a transnational inheritance fraud scheme that targeted elderly and vulnerable Americans.
In a Friday statement published on the US Department of Justice website, the convict, Nnebocha, a 44-year-old man, and his co-conspirators “operated a lucrative transnational inheritance fraud scheme that exploited vulnerable people in the United States” over a period exceeding seven years.
According to court documents, Nnebocha and his co-conspirators sent hundreds of thousands of personalised letters to elderly individuals in the United States, falsely claiming that the sender was a representative of a bank in Spain and that the recipient was entitled to receive a multimillion-dollar inheritance left by a deceased family member.
The statement revealed that Nnebocha and his co-conspirators were arrested by authorities in Poland and extradited to the United States in September 2025.
The statement reads, “The conspirators then told the victims that, before they could receive their purported inheritance, they were required to send money for purported delivery fees, taxes, and payments regarding the inheritance. In total, the defendant and his co-conspirators defrauded over 400 U.S. victims of more than $6 million.
“In April 2025, Nnebocha was arrested by authorities in Poland and extradited to the United States in September 2025. In November 2025, Nnebocha pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit mail fraud and wire fraud. At sentencing, Nnebocha was sentenced to 97 months in prison, 3 years supervised release, and ordered to pay more than $6.8 million in restitution to the victims of his scheme.
“This is the second indicted case related to this international fraud scheme. Eight co-conspirators from the United Kingdom, Spain, Portugal, and Nigeria have previously been convicted and sentenced in connection with this scheme.”
The statement added, “Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; U.S. Attorney Jason Reding Quiñones for the Southern District of Florida; Inspector in Charge Bladismir Rojo of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service’s (USPIS) Miami Division; and Acting Special Agent in Charge Ray Rede of the Homeland Security Investigation (HSI) in Arizona made the announcement.
“USPIS and HSI investigated the case.”
The statement further revealed that the Senior Trial Attorney Phil Toomajian and Trial Attorney Joshua D. Rothman of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section are prosecuting the case.
“The Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs (OIA) worked with law enforcement partners in Poland to secure the arrest and extradition of Nnebocha. OIA, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, the FBI’s Legal Attache in Poland, INTERPOL, and Polish Authorities, all provided critical assistance,” the statement concluded.
