Justice Oluwatoyin Taiwo of a Special Offences Court sitting in Ikeja has adjourned further hearing in a suit involving some staff members of Fidelity Bank Plc till 24th and 27th November 2021 for the continuation of trial
The bank officials including Abisola Ahmed, Olusegun Babasola, Uchechukwu Uma and Jude Alphaeus, were alleged to have invented ATM cards and stole N.874b from American International Insurance Company Limited (AIICO), Interswitch, OVH Energy Marketing Limited, Fidelity Bank Sinking Fund account and FSL Securities LTD, in 3 days. The staff members were said to have hacked Fidelity Bank database, cloned over 22 ATM cards and stole the said sum of N874m from five corporate accounts registered in the bank within 3 days.
This revelation was made by the Head of Investigations Group of Internal Audit and Investigations Division of Fidelity Bank, Onovae Oghenovo. He told the court on 7th October 2021 that the five corporate accounts for which the said sum was withdrawn belong to AIICO, Interswitch, OVH Energy Marketing Limited, Fidelity Bank Sinking Fund account and FSL Securities LTD.
Oghenovo, who testified before the court, said that the accused bank officials fraudulently primed and linked ATM debits cards to the corporate accounts and then made various ATM cash withdrawals from different ATM terminals, POS purchases, bills payments as well as ATM fund transfers.
The four employees, who are currently facing a criminal trial, were docked and charged alongside one Adeowale Jeff Johnson (a businessman) on a 2-count charge of conspiracy and stealing by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
While led in evidence by the EFCC prosecutor, Nnaemeka Omewa, the witness said that between 12 July 2019 and 15 July 2019, the sum of N874m was fraudulently withdrawn from five accounts in Fidelity Bank.
The EFCC counsel told the court that the offence committed by the defendants contravened Sections 278(1)(2) & 285(1) and 9(b) of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2011.
The banker said, “I know the first, second, third and fourth defendants in the dock, except the fifth (referring to Johnson). The four defendants were employees of Fidelity Bank and they all worked in the Virtual Banking Unit.
“Sometime in July 2019, Babasola, who was in the Virtual Department, fraudulently accessed the victims’ accounts. When he was queried, he claimed he wasn’t the one that viewed the accounts. But we later found out that his private token was opened on his mobile phone.
“Moreover, Virtual Bank doesn’t interface directly with customers but rely on requests from the call centre unit.
“Babasola viewed the accounts from his mobile phone and soft tokens were generated to access the 5 victims accounts.
“On July 11, Ahmed also viewed the same five accounts. And upon query, he claimed he responded to a customer’s request. But upon enquiry, we discovered that no request was made.
“Also Uchechukwu viewed the account of FSL Securities LTD between 10th and 13th of July. My Lord, before 11 July, none of the victims’ accounts had ATM cards. Again, between the 12th till 15th of July, Uchechukwu and Jude’s profiles were also used to enhance withdrawal limits of ATM cards. For example, an ATM card limit of N150, 000 was enhanced to 150 Million”.
When asked if he could recall the amounts that were withdrawn from each victim’s account, the witness said: “The sum of N1.7m was withdrawn via cash from AIICO and N20 million was transferred to 3rd parties. Making it an estimated N22m withdrawal.
“The sum of N115, 260, 000 was withdrawn from Interswitch account. The cash sum of N61.8m was withdrawn from OVH Energy accounts, while N500, 000 was transferred to a third party. Also, N9m was transferred from the Fidelity Bank Sinking Fund account. While N6, 257, 000 was withdrawn from the FSL Securities account and used to pay bills, N281m was withdrawn using ATM and N44m was withdrawn using a POS. When the bank found out about this theft, we quickly reported it to the EFCC”.
At this point the EFCC prosecutor tendered the petition written to the commission, dated 16 July, in evidence.
