Fatade Idowu Olamilekan, Multimillion Dollar Fraud, New York 2022
Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced today that Fataade Idowu Olamilekan, a/k/a ‘Fatade Olamilekan Idowu,’ a/k/a ‘Olamilekan Idowu Fatade,’ a/k/a ‘Idowu Fatade,’ a citizen of Nigeria, was sentenced to five years in prison in connection with a scheme to fraudulently obtain and attempt to obtain millions of dollars of medical equipment, laboratory products, computer equipment and hardware, and other merchandise from suppliers of such merchandise across the United States by impersonating, among other individuals, procurement officials of U.S. state and local governments and educational institutions.
The defendant, Fatade Idowu Olamilekan, engaged in a scheme to fraudulently obtain and attempt to obtain millions of dollars of medical equipment, laboratory products, computer equipment and hardware, and other merchandise from suppliers of such merchandise across the United States by impersonating, among other individuals, procurement officials of U.S. state and local governments and educational institutions.
Fatade Idowu Olamilekan, a/k/a ‘Fatade Olamilekan Idowu,’ a/k/a ‘Olamilekan Idowu Fatade,’ a/k/a ‘Idowu Fatade,’ was arrested in Nigeria on October 1, 2021, and extradited from Nigeria to the United States on July 14, 2022, and he has been detained since his arrest.
The defendant, Fatade Idowu Olamilekan, previously pled guilty to wire fraud before U.S. District Judge Valerie E. Caproni, who imposed today’s sentence.
According to the allegations in the Indictment and other court documents, Fatade Idowu Olamilekan engaged in the following conduct to carry out his criminal scheme:
First, Fatade Idowu Olamilekan engaged in extensive research to identify specific procurement officials of U.S. state and local governments and educational institutions to impersonate and U.S. suppliers of medical, laboratory, and computer equipment to target as part of the scheme. This research included obtaining information about the current suppliers to the state and local governments and educational institutions Fatade Idowu Olamilekan sought to impersonate and targeting those suppliers in order to avoid arousing suspicion.
Second, after Fatade Idowu Olamilekan identified procurement officials to impersonate, he used aliases and a Lithuanian web hosting company to register email accounts with domains that had slight variations from the legitimate email accounts used by procurement officials in order to ‘spoof’ or impersonate those officials’ email accounts (the ‘spoofed emailed accounts’). The spoofed email accounts used by Fatade Idowu Olamilekan usually had the same username as the procurement official’s email account but added an extra letter or common domain name to the domain of the email account.
The defendant, Fatade Idowu Olamilekan, will now face substantial prison time for his criminal conduct. This case demonstrates that we will go to great lengths to pursue defendants located abroad who seek to defraud American businesses and individuals.
Defendant/Respondent: Fatade Idowu Olamilekan (a/k/a Fatade Olamilekan Idowu, a/k/a Olamilekan Idowu Fatade, a/k/a Idowu Fatade)
Criminal Charges: Wire fraud
City and State: New York
Exact Date: October 1, 2021 (arrest date) and July 14, 2022 (extradition date)
Sentence: Five years in prison
Dollar Amounts: Millions of dollars of medical equipment, laboratory products, computer equipment and hardware, and other merchandise
Key Facts
- State: New York
- Category: Fraud & Financial Crimes
- Source: DOJ Press Release â†â€â€
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