COLUMBUS, Ohio — A Columbus man was sentenced to more than two years in prison and ordered to pay $840,000 in restitution Tuesday after pleading guilty to laundering romance fraud proceeds.
Court documents say from December 2014 to at least April 2022, Mubarik Ibrahim and his co-conspirators laundered proceeds of online romance scams.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the perpetrators of the romance scams created several profiles on online dating or social media sites. They contacted men and women throughout the country and cultivated a sense of affection and, often, romance.
After establishing a relationship with the victim, they would then request money, ordinarily for investment reasons or need-based reasons.
They would provide account information and direct their victims to where the money should be sent. The DOJ’s office says that the accounts were in part controlled by Ibrahim.
He did not commit the romance fraud itself but laundered the fraud proceeds.
With his co-conspirators, he funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars in proceeds from romance scams into bank accounts under his control.
Ibrahim then made transactions including transfers of funds to other accounts by check, cash, withdrawals, purchases of official checks, transfers to third parties, transfers by money service business, ATM cash withdrawals in the U.S. and wires to people and companies in the U.S.
Ibrahim knew the funds were proceeds of romance fraud and also knew the transactions were designed to conceal the source and move the funds from the U.S. to Ghana.
Accounts in his control received approximately $839,803.81 in criminally derived funds. The DOJ’s office also said that he attempted to launder an additional $339,217.77 into a bank account he controlled which the bank returned to the victim due to a “fraud recall.”
Ibrahim is sentenced to 27 months in prison.
