HAGÅTÑA (The Guam Daily Post) — A man involved in an inheritance scheme is set to plead guilty in the District Court of Guam on Thursday.
A plea agreement was filed in the District Court of Guam for Marcus Unigwe, who was one of several defendants charged in connection to an inheritance scheme that victimized dozens of people on Guam.
The terms of the plea agreement state Unigwe will plead guilty to conspiracy to operate an unlawful money-transmitting business, which carries a maximum five-year prison sentence and no more than a $250,000 fine.
The factual basis for the plea states Unigwe, between 2018 and Nov. 30, 2019, was engaged in a conspiracy to transport funds derived from “an advance inheritance scam conducted via the internet that involved Guam-based victims.”
Unigwe, a Nigerian citizen and resident of Georgia, additionally owned and operated Richland Concepts LLC in Atlanta, a company that bought used vehicles at auctions and shipped them to Ghana and Nigeria. Unigwe, however, used the company’s bank account to obtain “laundered funds” from co-defendants in Texas.
According to the plea, Unigwe obtained a total of $947,200 across about 30 transactions between March through July 2019.
After the plea agreement was filed, Unigwe was scheduled to be sentenced on Thursday in the District Court of Guam.
Co-defendants
The co-defendants from Texas who sent money to Unigwe were Mekayda and Monique Jones, who made the trip to Guam for their trial in the federal court in February 2023.
As a result of the trial, Monique Jones was found guilty of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to launder monetary instruments and 25 counts of wire fraud and was sentenced to four years in prison and ordered to pay $578,130 in restitution.
Mekayda Jones was found guilty of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to launder monetary instruments and 14 counts of wire fraud and was sentenced to three years in prison and ordered to pay $387,160 in restitution.
Sally Roberto, a resident of Guam, was also on trial in February 2023 with Mekayda and Monique Jones. Roberto was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison and ordered to pay $1,030,990 in restitution for conspiracy to commit wire fraud and 38 counts of wire fraud.
During the trial, federal prosecutors revealed the scheme began in 2015 with Teresa Pereda, when she was convinced by a woman on Facebook that she would receive money from the woman’s inheritance if she paid processing fees.
Pereda wasn’t on trial because she had already been sentenced to eight years in federal prison when she ran out of money after convincing others on the island, including Roberto, to pay money with the same promise.
As for Monique Jones and Mekayda Jones, two women from Texas, they never interacted with Roberto but were instead “money movers” for co-defendant Onyebachum Oseji, who asked the women to move his money among their bank accounts and wire money to other companies.
Other co-defendants, along with Oseji, included Jide Abimbola, Okechukwu Iwuji and Unigwe, who were Nigerian citizens with Florida addresses charged in connection to the conspiracy, which involved sending the wired money to Nigeria, according to Post files.
Iwuji was sentenced to 45 months, while Abimbola and Oseji have yet to be sentenced.
The District Court of Guam is seen on Thursday, Jan. 25, 2024, in Hagåtña.
