Holy Crime: How A Lagos Prophet Allegedly Swindled Church Member Of N5 Million

According to a revealing report by Vanguard, a man of God has allegedly defrauded a former church member, Ms. Rita Okoro, of N5,000,000, being part of the total sum he had obtained from her and her family members while pretending to assist in securing the release of her brother, who had been detained by police in Lagos since January 17.

Ms. Okoro and her sister, Ngozi, were members of the prophet’s church until they discovered that he had been taking advantage of their predicament, like many other members of his church, to exploit and defraud them.

Ms. Okoro says that sometime in January, following the arrest and indefinite detention of her brother by police operatives from the Special Anti Robbery Squad, Ikeja, Lagos, over an allegation of being an informant to a kidnapping gang, and frustrated by the persistent refusal by SARS to either charge him to court or even allow their family or legal representatives to see him, they approached the prophet for assistance.

She also disclosed that the prophet agreed to help and told them he's made calls to a top police officer and even travelled to Force Headquarters, Abuja. He then started demanding money for logistics, and at different times, she had given money to the prophet and paid some into his account, amounting to N5,000,000.

“At this point, we sensed foul play and wrote a petition through Network for Police Reform in Nigeria (NOPRIN) to Special Fraud Unit (SFU) EFCC and ICPC with a view to assisting me recover my money and to investigate the prophet’s activities.”