Two Ghanaians in the United States of America have been arrested for their involvement in the supposed unlawful transfers of money through organised online scam to culprits in Ghana.
The mother and daughter who lived in Maryland were picked by the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), according to US court documents dated April 8, 2022.
As indicated by court documents cited by ghanaianwatch.com , Whitney Adams and her mom, Flava Annang were fingered as co-plotters in assisting their accomplices in Ghana with working with counterfeit romance and inheritance scam against innocent victims in the US.
In the mean time, Whitney Adams has been identified as a luxurious living Snapchat influencer named ‘Girl Boss.
Ghanaian mother and girl arrested in US for helping ‘fraud boys’ launder money to Ghana.
The District Court of Arizona in a statement of complaint revealed that the people in question, typically old people, were persuaded by the two “to send cash to, or on behalf of , those fake romantic partners to collect a fake inheritance that was apparently due to the romantic partner.”
As indicated by the FBI Special Agent, “unknown co-schemers made fake online dating profiles and personas to take part in web-based chats , text messages, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls, and in any case with unsuspecting Victims living in the United States in an attempt to persuade those Victims they were engaged with a web-based romantic relationship with a genuine individual”.
Between July 2018 and April this year, the couple had purportedly opened multiple bank account to receive and negotiate funds sent by victims .
The reports additionally specified a couple of victims across the US who had been swindled out to this same fraud .
The complainant detailed that one of the people in question, a 67-year-elderly person, was misled to pay $283,000 between 2018 to 2020 while another, aged 68, sent $5 million “in a fruitless work to collect the inheritance ” somewhere between 2015 and 2022 among others
Whenever Annang and Adams received victims funds , they would use their different bank account to accept bank wire or bank deposits , or deposit checks received through the mail, and afterward dispersed the funds to different accounts or to location outside the United States, all to some degree to hide the nature, source, and control of those funds ,” the reports disclosed .
The complainant further made sense of how the suspects supported their accomplices in Accra to take care of business.
“On July 21, 2020, Annang was recorded as the Registered Agent for Flavy Merchandising LLC with the Maryland Department of State Business Registration (MDSBR). On January 11, 2021, ADAMS was recorded as the Registered Agent for McWells Auto Logistics, LLC with the MDSBR. Both Annang and Adams opened and managed with a few domestic bank accounts to received and negotiate funds sent by Victims of these fake romance organised crime.
The Department of Justice Building in Washington, D.C., U.S. Picture taker: Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg by means of Getty Images