Augustine and Peter have been found guilty of defrauding Vietnamese women through online relationships.
For swindling various Vietnamese women to the tune of $130,000, two Nigerian men have been jailed by the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Court in Vietnam.
The Nigerians - 32-year-old Ihugba Augustine Chinonso, and 33-year-old Onu Chinonso Peter - were sentenced to 16 and 12 years in prison on Monday, July 16, 2018.
Augustine and Peter, who were found guilty of defrauding Vietnamese women through online relationships, bagged their jail terms for appropriating property through swindling.
The two Nigerians were sentenced alongside six Vietnamese and accomplices by the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Court for "forging seals and documents of agencies or organizations."
In addition to the jail sentences, the two Nigerians and six Vietnamese men were required to return all the swindled money to their victims.
How Vietnamese women were conned
According to the indictment on Augustine and Peter, the Nigerians set up fake accounts on social networks to lure Vietnamese women, who they befriended.
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The Nigerians, who also claim to be living in London, will worm their ways into the hears of their unsuspecting victims and promise to send them cash and expensive gifts.
The plot becomes thickened when Vietnamese accomplices then pretend to be employees from delivery companies, customs officers or police officers and demanded that the women transfer delivery fees, customs fees or fines to their bank accounts before they can redeem the gifts from their lovers.
After each successful scam, the Vietnamese accomplices got to keep 15-25 percent of the money.
How the fraud gang was busted
Chau, a victim, alerted the police in February 2016 after the gang had successfully swindled her of over $5,000.
Chau narrated to the police how she was in a relationship with a foreigner claiming to be British on Facebook in January 2016.
She told the police that the man promised to send her $100,000 in cash and other expensive gifts a month later but by February, a woman claiming to be from a delivery company called to ask her to pay a $1,200 delivery fee and a VND80 million ($3,500) customs fee for a gift from overseas, which she paid.
Chau further said the woman then claimed she had not received the money and had Chau send her another VND112 million.
She suspected a foul play when another man claiming to be an officer from Hanoi's economic police told her to pay a VND200 million fine as her package contained a large amount of cash.
The police's intervention led to the arrest of the fake police officer and his wife.
In January 2018, 43-year-old Nigeriam Remigius Duru Okonkwo, was been arrested and arraigned before a Phnom Penh court, in Cambodia, for allegedly defrauding a Vietnamese businesswoman, Darg Mai Nga, of $356,000.