Two Nigerian nationals are accused of attempting to steal about $25 million from nearly two dozen hospitals, schools and universities around the United States, including about $2.9 million from Oregon’s Portland Public Schools district in 2019.
Efeturi Ariawhorai, also known as Efeturi Simeon, 35, and Ikenna Nwajiaku, 41, each face an 11-count indictment, charging them with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
The two remain fugitives. Ariawhorai was arrested in Italy in November but fled house arrest before he could be transferred to Oregon. He’s believed to be living in the United Arab Emirates. Nwajiaku is suspected of living in or near Lagos, Nigeria, according to federal investigators.
The attempted theft from Portland Public Schools occurred when a fraudster posing as one of the district’s construction contractors tricked employees into green-lighting the $2.9 million payment, district officials said at the time.
The scam was caught while the millions were still in the fraudster’s bank account, and most of the money was returned to the district’s Wells Fargo account within days, officials said.
The two defendants’ alleged fraud occurred from August 2019 through December 2020 and targeted a total of about $25.2 million from 20 different organizations, school districts or hospitals, the indictment said. The actual loss was $6.2 million to 15 organizations, according to investigators.
Other victims included school districts in California, Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa and Texas; colleges and universities in Georgia, Wyoming, Idaho, Florida and Delaware; and hospitals in Indiana, Minnesota and Michigan, according to the indictment. An unnamed university in Delaware, for example, and an unnamed school district in Texas each recorded a $1.8 million loss, according to the indictment.
Ariawhorai and Nwajiaku would contact organizations by email, impersonate employees of their organizations or professionals doing business with them and convince the organizations or schools to send payments to bank accounts controlled by third parties acting on the behalf of Ariawhorai and Nwajiaku, according to the FBI.
They used false names, virtual private networks and leased infrastructure to conceal the fraud, and they would register internet domain names with slight variations to trick victim organizations, according to investigators.
Federal law enforcement officials are working to retrieve money mistakenly sent to unknown bank accounts, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Quinn Harrington, chief of the Oregon U.S. Attorney’s Office cyber and national security unit.
“The level of greed it takes to steal from schools and hospitals, especially during the height of a global pandemic, is beyond disturbing,” Kieran L. Ramsey, special agent in charge of Oregon’s FBI, said in a statement.
Ramsey said the FBI was able to freeze funds and return a majority of the stolen money, including the loss of nearly $3 million to the Portland school district.
Authorities urged victims of online or internet-enabled crimes to file reports online with IC3 at www.ic3.gov or call a local FBI field office.
-- Maxine Bernstein
Email mbernstein@oregonian.com; 503-221-8212
Follow on Twitter @maxoregonian
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