A Magistrate Court in Kenya has ordered the extradition of a businessman Abdulrahman Juma to the United States to face money laundering charges.
Milimani Chief Magistrate Wendy Micheni, on September 23, granted extradition orders against Mr Juma allowing US authorities to open charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering and aggravated identity theft.
Micheni maintained that there was no evidence to show that Juma would not receive a fair trial in the US.
“The fugitive is said to be part of a syndicate that orchestrated a scheme with his co-conspirators who are already before the United States District Court for the Central District of California to defraud a victim who was seeking a lender to invest in a project to build a school,” documents from the office of Director of Public Prosecution said.
Juma is alleged to be part of an international fraud scheme put together by convicted Nigerian fraudster Ramon Abass aka Hushpuppi to cheat a tycoon seeking to invest in a multimillion project to construct a school in Qatar.
A top police officer in Nigeria Abba Kyari was also indicted in the Juma case by the government’s investigation, named among five of Hushpuppi’s co-conspirators in a $1.1million fraud charge.
A Nigerian court has already blocked Kyari’s extradition because he is facing drug trafficking charges.
Hushpuppi started speaking with the victim, posing as a Wells Fargo Bank employee named Malik. Both men then opened a bank account at Wells Fargo Bank in Canoga Park, California, using the name of the Qatari victim company.
The document notes that between December 19 and 24, 2019, Hushpuppi and Juma conned the victim into paying $330,000 to fund an investor’s account to facilitate a $15 million loan.
Last week, Hushpuppi and his lawyer Louis Shapiro successfully convinced US federal judge Otis D. Wright to delay his sentencing after multiple appeals. The sentencing hearing is now scheduled for November 3.
Shapiro argued that Hushpuppi would have been unable to prepare for his sentencing hearing without all the documents relating to the Juma case.
In July 2021, Hushpuppi pleaded guilty to multimillion-dollar fraud charges as part of a plea bargain he entered with the US authorities.
