Boma Achenimie 
Ogunjobi Olalekan, a witness has described how Eze Harrison Arinze, a suspect earned $382,000 in bitcoins from his victims before having his account frozen by his Virtual Asset Service provider.
The first prosecution witness in Arinze’s trial, Olalekan, a member of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), claimed that the defendant tricked his victim into withdrawing money and transferring it into his (Arinze’s) Bitcoin accounts.
When depositing their bitcoin into the suspect’s accounts, Arinze’s victims believed they were conducting legal business, according to Olalekan, who testified before Justice J. K. Omotosho of the Federal High Court in Abuja.
On March 22, 2023, Arinze appeared in court before Justice Omotosho and was charged with five offenses related to money laundering and obtaining property under pretenses totaling $769,263. When the accusations were read to him, he entered a plea of not guilty.
But at the resumed trial of the case, Olalekan told the court, “We requested for users on the platform who have deposited cryptocurrency to the defendant’s account and their names were provided. About 30 persons on the platforms deposited various sums of Bitcoin to the defendant’s account.
“Those that were identified were from 13 different countries- the total inflow to his Bitcoin wallet address based on the response was about 15.5btc valued around $382,000 (Three Hundred and Eighty-Two United States Dollars and the defendant has withdrawn about 5btc before it was blocked.
“We got the information of these users who deposited the funds, showing their user identities, location, money deposited at different intervals, wallet addresses where these funds were sent to at different intervals,” he said.
He further stated that other vital information like “the amount they sent, dollar equivalent, email addresses of depositors, transaction identities” were also disclosed.
Olalekan told the court that 28 out of the 30 depositors were reached through their email addresses to establish the purpose of the various sums they deposited in the defendant’s account and what they knew about “Swiss-Coin, Swiss earning, Swiss coins, and Digitrades Ltd.”
After hearing the witness testimony, Justice Omotosho ordered the defendant to be kept in the Kuje Correctional Facility and postponed the case to June 14, 2023
