Benin has extradited Akinade Adedeji Raheem, a 43-year-old Nigerian charged in a stolen-identity scheme that sought more than $100 million in fraudulent tax refunds from the Internal Revenue Service, to the United States, where a federal court ordered him held by the US Marshals Service, the Justice Department said.
Federal agents first tried to arrest Raheem at his residence in April 2026 and could not find him. Investigators then learned he had booked a flight from Mexico City to Benin, according to the department. He landed in Benin on April 15, and local authorities arrested him that day under an INTERPOL Red Notice. The Justice Department described his transfer as only the second handover of a suspect from Benin to the United States in history.
The timing matters. The department publicly announced charges against Raheem and a second man on April 15, the same day he arrived in Benin, and described him in that announcement as living in Atlanta. A grand jury in the Northern District of Georgia had indicted him on February 24, 2026.
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The indictment charges Raheem with conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, 14 counts of access device fraud and 14 counts of aggravated identity theft. The maximum penalties are 20 years for each conspiracy count and 10 years for access device fraud, with a mandatory two-year sentence attached to the aggravated identity theft charges. The Justice Department stressed that the indictment contains allegations and that Raheem and the other defendants are presumed innocent unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
Prosecutors allege that Raheem and co-conspirators filed more than 300 fraudulent tax returns between 2018 and 2023. To do so, they allegedly collected the names, addresses and Social Security numbers of American taxpayers and tax professionals, partly by opening online IRS accounts that gave them access to private taxpayer records. Refunds were then allegedly routed to prepaid debit cards linked to addresses the suspects controlled.
The laundering stage, according to court documents, relied on money orders bought in amounts designed to stay under reporting requirements. Prosecutors say the proceeds went toward used cars purchased through auction platforms, some of which were shipped to Nigeria and other locations, along with designer clothing and other goods.
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A second man, Abayomi Quadri Eletu, 42, who lives in both the United Kingdom and Nigeria, was named in the same scheme. He was indicted separately and arrested in the United Kingdom, where extradition proceedings are pending, according to the Justice Department’s account. The department’s April announcement said he faces five counts of mail fraud, three of wire fraud, seven of access device fraud and 21 of aggravated identity theft, and that he allegedly directed Raheem and others to obtain the prepaid cards that would receive the refunds. Those are allegations, and he has not been tried.
US Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg said the evidence points to an operation that obtained hundreds of stolen identities, filed fraudulent returns with them and moved the money through prepaid cards and car purchases. “The scope of the alleged fraud is staggering,” he said. He credited prosecutors and law enforcement partners abroad for the extradition.
The Texas field office of IRS Criminal Investigation, through Special Agent in Charge Christopher J. Altemus Jr., called Raheem an alleged co-conspirator in a nationwide identity theft scheme that victimized hundreds of taxpayers and also took money from the US Treasury, affecting programs that serve the public. Altemus said authorities are working across borders to recover stolen money and bring suspects to court. Anthony Colello, the special agent in charge for the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, said the case reflects investigators’ resolve to track down and prosecute people who defraud Americans.
The case follows other extraditions in tax-refund cases tied to Nigerian suspects. Matthew A. Akande, a Nigerian national living in Mexico, was arrested at London’s Heathrow Airport in October 2024 and extradited to the United States on March 5, 2025. Prosecutors in Massachusetts allege he and co-conspirators filed more than 1,000 fraudulent returns over about five years, seeking $8.1 million in refunds and collecting more than $1.3 million.
IRS Criminal Investigation and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration are investigating the Raheem case, with help from international law enforcement agencies and authorities in Benin and the United Kingdom. Assistant US Attorney Brian Pearce, Senior Litigation Counsel Michael C. Boteler and Trial Attorney Michael Jones are prosecuting it.
