Two Nigerian men have been jailed in the United Kingdom alongside a third accomplice after being convicted of defrauding eight victims of more than £4 million in cryptocurrency by posing as police officers. 

Anthony Ikenwe, 29, and Kevin Nwamma, 25, were sentenced at Southwark Crown Court alongside Hamza Bashir, 23, following a lengthy investigation by the Metropolitan Police’s cryptocurrency team.

According to the court, the trio called their victims and falsely claimed that their cryptocurrency holdings were at risk, before persuading them to either hand over account details or transfer their digital assets into what they were told were secure police accounts.

To make the scheme convincing, the group built professional looking fake police websites, but the moment victims complied, their cryptocurrency was immediately stolen and funnelled through a complex laundering network designed to obscure its origin.

Ikenwe was sentenced to six years for conspiracy to commit fraud and five years for money laundering, with both terms running concurrently, while Nwamma received an identical sentence for his role in the scheme. Bashir, who initially denied any involvement and only changed his plea on the eighth day of his trial, was handed three years and nine months for fraud alongside a concurrent three year term for money laundering. Both Ikenwe and Nwamma had pleaded guilty in April to conspiracy to defraud along with several counts of converting criminal property.

Investigators say the men used the stolen funds to bankroll a lavish lifestyle far beyond their declared means, with one of them recording an annual income of just £444 despite the group’s spending habits. Detectives traced purchases including a car worth almost £60,000 bought with cryptocurrency, roughly £500,000 in cash stored in a safety deposit box in Dubai, and holidays across Thailand, Japan, Paris, Mykonos, the Maldives and the Seychelles, alongside shopping trips to luxury outlets such as Harrods and Hermès.

The men were arrested during coordinated raids across London and Essex in November, with footage released by the Metropolitan Police showing Nwamma being detained at his home in Watford while still in bed. Officers seized around 40 mobile phones along with luxury goods and cryptocurrency assets during the operation, and have so far recovered approximately £1 million linked directly to victims’ stolen funds, with investigations continuing to trace the remainder and identify any additional suspects.

Detective Inspector Geoff Donoghue of the Met’s Cryptocurrency Team described the case as a highly complex investigation into a group of calculated manipulators who exploited victims’ trust by posing as law enforcement, warning that no legitimate police force will ever ask members of the public to transfer cryptocurrency into a so called safe account.

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