REMANDED OVER N700,000 FRAUD IS AN ALLEGED WHATSAPP HACKER.

Babatunji Wusu –

Stephen Andrew Ojo, a purported WhatsApp hacker, has been remanded to the Nigerian Correctional Services’ Ikoyi Center by a Federal High Court in Lagos.

After the defendant was arraigned by the officers of the Zone 2 Police Command, Onikan, Lagos, Justice Akintayo Aluko placed him under remand.

He was charged by the police on four counts that included identity theft, conspiracy, and obtaining under false pretenses.

Earlier, during the arraignment on Wednesday, the police prosecutor, Zebedee Arekhandia, told the court that on September 12, 2023, at Ajao Estate, Lagos, the defendant and other others who are still at large conspired to conspire and hack one Mrs. Laraba Shuaibu’s WhatsApp account in order to impersonate her.

Arekhandia also told the court that the purported WhatsApp hacker and other individuals who are still at large utilized the compromised platform to steal N700,000 from a woman named Mrs. Osasu Tina Eriamiatoe.

Sections 8(a) and 1(3)(a) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Fraud Related Offences Act, 2006, as well as Sections 24 (2)(a)(b) (i)(ii) and (iii) of the Cybercrime (Prohibition, Prevention, etc.) Act, 2015, and Section 15 (1) of the Money Laundering (Prohibition) Act, 2022 as amended in 2012, were cited by the prosecutor as violations of the law.

The defendant informed the court that he was not the one who did the claimed crime while entering a guilty plea to the offenses.

After he entered a guilty plea and made his statement, the vacation judge, Justice Aluko, issued an order remanding him to the Ikoyi center until January 24, 2024, at which point the Chief Judge of the court will transfer his case file to the substantive judge.