back to article Cybercrim told to cough up £1m or spend years in chokey

A cybercriminal from Thamesmead has been given six months to turn up £1m, or he'll be spending another four years behind bars. Rilwan Adesegun Oshodi – a 31-year-old Nigerian national, formerly of Greenhaven Drive, Thamesmead, SE28 – is currently enjoying Her Majesty's hospitality for conspiracy to defraud and conspiracy to …

  1. bigtimehustler

    I guess it depends if he values those 4 years more or less than the 1 million, if as a person you decide 4 years (it won't be 4 with good behavior anyway, it is 'up to' 4 years) is worth it for the money, it isn't a bad deal for a nice life after.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Quarter of a mil a year isn't bad pay.

      I'm also not sure how this works. I'm currently living abroad and here bank details get passed around a lot. Go out with the team for a night out and someone will pay and then send their bank details the next day for us all to pay our part. That sort of thing is quite common and companies have to publish their bank details by law.

      Another example was when I started playing footie and someone sent round their account details so I could pay my part of the pitch hire etc. Same for a gift for one of the kids classmates who was in hospital long term.

      Why is it in the UK that handing out these kind of details causes such problems but not here in another European country?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Bank details as in sort code and account number aren't an issue (apart from a bit of Direct Debit annoyance), however bank details including passwords, dob, mother's maiden name, etc is.

        I suspect the 'bank details' part includes more than just the victim's sort code and account number.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Still not really enough is it? A password won't help unless you've got the card reader which generates the login key.

          DOBs are hardly top secret so that can't be it and neither are mother's maiden names, especially as abroad women tend to keep them on legal documents.

          But yes, I suppose if the "victim" was daft enough to give them enough information then eventually might get in. Perhaps the difference here is that changes like that would require a visit to a branch with an ID card which is that little bit harder to fake.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Well down vote all you like... the bottom line is that they don't get that kind of fraud where I'm currently living, yet it seems to happen a lot in the UK.

            I suggested some reasons why, if you believe them to be wrong then I'd be genuinely interested to know what other reasons there might be.

  2. Scuby
    Pint

    Hmmmm, so, 4 additional years in prison on room and board and whatever else convicted crims get these days, then get released and have a nice little sum to live on for the rest of his days (assuming he hasn't spent it all) OR, hand it all back and get out in 3ish years for good behaviour.

    Hmmmm, let me think...

    1. PleebSmash

      Found guilty last April, Oshodi is serving an eight-year prison sentence for his part in a phishing attack which netted a gang of eight cybercrims almost £1m of a woman's life savings. According to the Met Police, the gang blew the stolen savings on items from "cheeseburgers to high-end computers and gold". As George Best might say, the rest they just frittered away.

      I don't get the feeling Oshodi has £1m sitting somewhere.

  3. dogged
    Holmes

    and this confiscation order aims to literally make him pay for what he has done," continued DS Azad. "The money will go back into policing and the criminal justice system, helping us continue to put people like Oshodi before the courts."

    So it goes to the police. Not the woman he stole it from, then.

    1. Dan Wilkie

      Presumably if she had 1M in the bank she'd have insurance which would have payed out...

      And to the rest of you - the confiscation order remains in effect till he pays it, so he still won't be able to legitimately make money after he gets out till its paid back and of course, he'll have learned his lesson by then so wouldn't think of doing anything dishonest.

      1. I Am Spartacus

        He already has 8 year in chokey. The extra 4 are on top of that. The dont run in parallel.

        Plus he faces deportation as soon as he comes out.

        1. Otto is a bear.

          Gone

          I suspect that if they had frittered it all away, he might have difficulty paying up. Alternately if he pays up then you have to wonder how much else he has acquired.

          As for the lady's £1M, I would guess the bank is on the hook for that. They changed the access details, probably without informing the original address, which my bank does.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Plus he faces deportation as soon as he comes out

          Not if Labour get in, he'll be given asylum and a large house in London in case his Nigerian friends want their part of the money and would be violent towards him, cant go against his European Human Rights, I bet Cherie (milk the legal aid system) Blair is already preparing his case

      2. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

        "Presumably if she had 1M in the bank she'd have insurance which would have payed out..."

        So it should go to the insurance company. Or is that ok, since they just pass the cost on in higher premiums to us punters. Oh look! A "stealth tax" to pay for policing.

      3. John Savard

        Insurance just changes who the victim is. That would then mean he should have to pay full restitution to the insurance company.

        Of course, full insurance against all crime-related losses should be free of charge. Paid for by the government, which gets the money from criminals, not taxpayers.

    2. breakfast Silver badge
      Holmes

      The way they are cutting the police budgets, this will soon be their main stream of income. Well, this and speed cameras at any rate.

      One might hope that they will start having to investigate crimes with bigger returns until the only thing the Metropolitan Police can afford to do is investigate large-scale tax fraud in the City Of London. As the list of Tory Donors going through the dock gets longer, they may well find their budget reinstated...

    3. Anonymous John

      Her bank * has already reimbursed her. Reasonable, as I don't see why its automatic fraud detection didn't flag the transactions as iffy.

      * Depending on which bank, this could be the Taxpayer.

      1. John Savard

        Then he should have to reimburse the bank in full before paying money to be used for police and courts.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The money will go back into policing

    oh, and I thought it was meant to be returned to the victim. Silly me!

  5. Alistair
    Windows

    "I do not think that word means what you think it means"

    "Oshodi's sentence has taken him off the streets and this confiscation order aims to literally make him pay for what he has done," continued DS Azad. "The money will go back into policing and the criminal justice system, helping us continue to put people like Oshodi before the courts."

    Umm no, not literally. If the monies are going to someone *other* than the entity that ended up out of pocket in the original event, he isn't paying for his crime. Its a #$%@#% fine you ass.

  6. Cubical Drone

    I'm confused

    So, they gave him 8 years for stealing stuff and then they want to tack on 4 more for not giving the stuff back. I thought that not giving the stuff back was pretty much the definition of stealing.

    I could see it if they gave him 12 years and offered him 4 years off if he made restitution, but, while I in no way condone his actions, this doesn't seem to make since.

  7. Paul Smith

    double jepardy ?

    Is this an attempt to punish him twice for the same crime? He obviously has spent it all if he cant afford a brief good enough to get him off, so that means there is no realistic likeyhood of him being able to pay the "fine" for a crime he is already being punished for.

    The obvious thing to do then is declare himself bankrupt meaning his debtors can no longer place a lien on him, so he doesn't get the extra four years.

    1. Terry Cloth
      Meh

      Re: double je[o]pardy ?

      Don't know about things over there, but here in the Colonies criminal fines and restitutions are not dischargeable. Even if you've gone bankrupt, you still gotta pay the man.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The problem with these kinds of stories is that they never tell you...

    What happened to the victim? Did the bank cover the fraud, or was the victim left out of pocket? Because the fine isn't going to the victim, that point is well made....

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    As it should be...

    ...except it should be ten years added on instead of four. Many a crim will go to prison for four years for a million dollars.

    1. Cynic_999

      Re: As it should be...

      Many people choose to spend 4 years working hard in a place less comfortable and more isolated than a UK prison in order to earn far less than £250000 per year. He'd be a fool to pay up.

  10. Tezfair
    Facepalm

    how much is it costing us tax payers?

    Might be a great idea to keep them locked up for x years, but in the end it's costing us £££'s to keep him there. Far better to deport him and save on the prison bill as there is 0 chance of seeing that £1m

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    There is a sensible argument

    To bring back "penal servitude" ie hard labour for crimes involving mass theft or fraud.

    Under such a system criminals would be expected to work 10 hours a day including weekends

    to pay off their debt to society and at least a proportion of their cost of incarceration.

    Deporting them just moves the problem somewhere else IMHO.

    Of course for some criminals (cough Cryptowall /cough), death by rectal giant hornet insertion would be poetic justice !!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: There is a sensible argument

      I just had a call from someone halfway around the world who is getting burned by Cryptowall.

      Seems punishment cannot be severe enough.

    2. Vic

      Re: There is a sensible argument

      bring back "penal servitude" ie hard labour

      Although it sounds somewhat mediaeval, there are a couple of arguments for it.

      Prisoners working that hard every day are unlikely to have the energy to be able to cause much trouble at other times - thus making for an easier environemt in the prison.

      Aditionally, physical exertion is good therapy for many forms of depression - so it would actually be good for the prisoners as well.

      Counter-intuitive though it might seem, hard labour is probably a good punishment all round - although I really don't expect many of the General Public to see it that way...

      Vic.

  12. John Savard

    Priorities

    Before he should be allowed to pay any money to be used for "policing and the criminal justice system", or, in fact, before he should even be allowed to pay his taxes, every cent taken from his victim should have to be returned to her.

    Yes: if you steal money from someone, then when your taxes are deducted, they should go straight to your victim instead of the government, meaning that interest and penalties will just add up until everything you stole was returned. Of course, I know this might not be popular with the government, so voters will have to put pressure on it.

  13. Phredd

    "The money will go back into policing and the criminal justice system, helping us continue to put people like Oshodi before the courts."

    Of course, if he pays it back, none of it will be returned to the crime victims. That almost never happens. The plods have to get their cut, don't ya know. The victim can just go live on the street.

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon

Other stories you might like