On Thursday, May 22, 2025, the Port Harcourt Zonal Directorate of the EFCC arraigned Ifeoma Joe and her 34-year-old son, Chima Mike Nmerem, before Justice P. I. Ajoku at the Federal High Court in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, for allegedly defrauding a U.S.-based Nigerian woman under the pretense of conducting spiritual cleansing.
They are being prosecuted on a four-count charge bordering on conspiracy, misrepresentation, advance fee fraud and obtaining money under false pretence to the tune of N64.4m.
One of the charges reads: “That you Ifeoma Joe between the 10th day of September, 2024 to 17th day of December, 2024 at Oyigbo Rivers State within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court with intent to defraud, obtained the aggregate sum of Sixty Four Million, Four Hundred and Eighty Six Thousand One Hundred and Eighty Naira (N64, 486, 180) only, from Mrs Felicia Ekwutasi Ikeh; which money was paid into account No: 0024475760 domiciled with Access Bank Plc and operated by Chima Mike Nmerem, under the pretence that the sum was requested by one Dr. Uma Ukpai for spiritual cleansing and settlement of detectives in a murder case in the United States of America which pretence you knew to be false and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1(1) (c) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Related Offences Act, 2006 and punishable under Section 1 (3) of the same Act.”
They pleaded “guilty” when the charges were read to them, following which prosecution counsel K. U. Udus called for a review of the case and informed the court of the presence of a prosecution witness who was ready to testify, but Justice Ajoku for want of time, adjourned the matter till May 28, 2025 for the review of facts of the case and ordered that the defendants be remanded in custody of the EFCC.
The defendants’ case with the EFCC began when a US-based petitioner alleged that she was introduced to the first defendant, Joe, by her sister for spiritual prayers that would prevent her son, who murdered his sibling in a fight, from going to jail and for the homicide case against him to be dismissed.
The petitioner alleged that the Joe was contracted following her claim that she has a close relationship with Evangelist Uma Ukpai, a renowned Christian preacher and further deceived her with a fake phone number of the man of God which the defendant herself allegedly answers and offers prayers for her with a pretended voice of a man of God whenever she calls the numbers.
After some alleged deceitful prayers, the first defendant, still pretending to be the man of God demanded for the sum of N900,000.00 (Nine Hundred Thousand Naira) which he would deposit at the altar. The petitioner allegedly provided the amount.
Investigation by the Commission further revealed that the defendant also deceived the victim into paying some amount of money running into millions for purported spiritual cleansing, donations to orphanages and spiritual settlements of detectives and prosecutors handling her son’s murder case and cash gifts to her surviving son’s employer, so that he would be reinstated in his place of work after the alleged spiritual interventions would have caused the murder case against him to be dismissed.
The victim also reported that she paid a Naira equivalent of the sum of $38,450 (Thirty-Eight Thousand, Four Hundred and Fifty United States Dollars) into the account of the first defendant.
By the time the petitioner allegedly realized that all was a scam, she disclosed that she had already transferred a total sum of N64, 486, 180 (Sixty Four Million, Four Hundred and Eighty Six Thousand One Hundred and Eighty Naira) to the first defendant via the second defendant’s bank account, domiciled in Access Bank, made available by the first defendant.
And all efforts by the petitioner to recover her money were to no avail.
