Baltimore, Maryland – U.S. District Judge Julie R. Rubin today sentenced Damilola Ojo, age 31, of Windsor Mill, Maryland, to 48 months in federal prison, followed by 2 years of supervised release, for charges related to a bank fraud scheme totaling more than $1.8 million. As part of his plea, Ojo also admitted to obtaining a fraudulent $475,000 COVID-19 CARES Act loan. Judge Rubin ordered Ojo to forfeit $20,000 and to pay restitution of $546,000.
The sentence was announced by Erek L. Barron, U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland and Special Agent in Charge Andrew McKay of the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (“TIGTA”).
According to his guilty plea, from April 2016 through August 2019, Damilola Ojo conspired with Jamelia Thompson, Victor Ojo, Raissa Kaossele, and others to commit Bank Fraud using the Internal Revenue Service’s (“IRS”) Modernized Internet Employer Identification Number (“Mod IEIN”) system. Mod IEIN is the IRS system that allows users to register for a unique Employer Identification Number (“EIN”). It requires users to enter the valid name and Social Security number of a real living person in order to obtain an EIN for a business.
The co-conspirators, including Damilola Ojo, created and used various EINs (or caused various EINs to be created and used) in furtherance of a scheme to defraud. Many of these EINs were obtained from the IRS using stolen Personally Identifiable Information (“PII”). These EINs, in conjunction with fraudulently obtained state business certificates, allowed the co-conspirators to open bank accounts at various financial institutions for the purpose of depositing stolen and/or altered checks or for receiving fraudulently obtained wire transfers.
Once obtained, the proceeds of this fraudulent activity were rapidly withdrawn and/or transferred to other bank accounts controlled by the co-conspirators. A co-conspirator’s Google account was the source of many of the fraudulent identification and business documents – packaged together as “work kits” – utilized throughout the conspiracy. M any of these emails were sent to electronic accounts linked to Damilola Ojo, who would then forward them to Thompson, Victor Ojo, Kaossele, and other co-conspirators – in addition to utilizing work kits himself. These co-conspirators would then open bank accounts using these work kits, they would send Damilola Ojo evidence of the fraudulent transactions that occurred using these bank accounts. Damilola Ojo would often receive portions of these transactions’ proceeds as they were rapidly dispersed. From the point Damilola Ojo joined the conspiracy, it had an intended loss of at least $1.8 million.
Upon his arrest, Damilola Ojo shared a residence with co-conspirator Thompson. In this shared residence, the Government located evidence of ongoing fraud: numerous ETN documents, business documents in other people’s names, numerous IDs in the names of individuals other than those who lived in the home, identification documents with authentication features, and bank cards in the name of other individuals.
In the plea agreement, Damilola Ojo also admitted to additional fraudulent activity involving a pandemic relief program under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (“CARES”) Act. Financial assistance offered through the CARES Act included forgivable loans to small businesses for job retention and certain other expenses, in this case through Economic Injury Disaster Loans (“EIDL”) administered by the U.S. Small Business Administration (“SBA”). On November 21, 2021, Thompson opened a bank account at Woodforest National Bank in Maryland in the name of her business “Jamaria Empire LLC.” On February 14, 2022, a $475,000 EIDL from the SBA was deposited into bank account xxxxxx2866. The intended recipient of this EIDL was the Idaho Women’s Charitable Foundation. Once deposited into bank account xxxxxx2866, these funds were depleted through checks to Damilola Ojo, Thompson, and Certified Promotions Ent LLC (a business registered in Maryland to Damilola Ojo). Upon Thompson’s and Damilola Ojo’s arrest, the EIN application and EIN documents for Jamaria Empire LLC were recovered from their shared residence. Images of a Woodforest Bank Card for Jamaria Empire LLC and a screenshot of the Jamaria Empire LLC bank account transaction history were recovered from Damilola Ojo’s phone, along with an image of the approved $475,000 EIDL. This fraudulent transaction caused $475,000 in actual loss that was reasonably foreseeable to Damilola Ojo.
Co-conspirator Jamelia Thompson, age 30, of Jamaica, previously pled guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud and was sentenced to 37 months in federal prison. Another co-conspirator, Raissa Kaossele, age 23, of Baltimore, Maryland, pled guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud and aggravated identity theft and was sentenced to 8 months in home confinement. Co-conspirator Victor Ojo has pled guilty to conspiracy to commit bank fraud and aggravated identity theft and remains to be sentenced.
The District of Maryland Strike Force is one of five strike forces established throughout the United States by the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute COVID-19 fraud, including fraud relating to the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (“CARES”) Act. The CARES Act was designed to provide emergency financial assistance to Americans suffering the economic effects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The strike forces focus on large-scale, multi-state pandemic relief fraud perpetrated by criminal organizations and transnational actors. The strike forces are interagency law enforcement efforts, using prosecutor-led and data analyst-driven teams designed to identify and bring to justice those who stole pandemic relief funds.
For more information on the Department’s response to the pandemic, please visit https://www.justice.gov/coronavirus. Anyone with information about allegations of attempted fraud involving COVID-19 can report it by calling the Department of Justice’s National Center for Disaster Fraud (NCDF) Hotline at 866-720-5721 or via the NCDF Web Complaint Form at: https://www.justice.gov/disaster-fraud/ncdf-disaster-complaint-form.
U.S. Attorney Barron commended the TIGTA for their work in the investigation. Mr. Barron thanked Assistant U.S. Attorneys Joseph L. Wenner and Paul Riley who prosecuted the federal case. He also recognized the assistance of the Maryland COVID-19 Strike Force Paralegal Specialist Joanna B.N. Huber.
For more information on the Maryland U.S. Attorney’s Office, its priorities, and resources available to help the community, please visit www.justice.gov/usao-md and https://www.justice.gov/usao-md/community-outreach.
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