Hushpuppi's lawyer says FBI 'kidnapped' Nigerian Instagrammer from Dubai
By Larry Madowo

A Nigerian man accused of multimillion-dollar fraud and money laundering by the United States was kidnapped by the FBI from Dubai, his lawyer says.
Ramon Olorunwa Abbas - known to his 2.5 million Instagram followers as Ray Hushpuppi - and another cyber-heist suspect Olalekan Jacob Ponle (aka Mr Woodberry) were arrested in Dubai, where they lived, in June.
They then appeared in a Chicago court on 3 July.
The United Arab Emirates has no extradition treaty with the United States but Dubai police said they had been extradited to the US.
A spokesman for the US Department of Justice told the BBC that Hushpuppi was expelled from Dubai and was not extradited. He did not answer how he ended up in US custody.

What does Hushpuppi's lawyer say?
Mr Abbas' lawyer Gal Pissetzky told the BBC that his client, who posts on Instagram about his extravagant lifestyle, was not a criminal and had made his money legitimately.
"He is a social media influencer with millions of followers, with millions of people that respect and loved him, and he loved them, and that's what he did. In today's society, that's a business," he said.
Mr Pissetzky admits that he is not "100% familiar" with social media and his children consider him too old but he knows "that's how people make money today".

Report
The Chicago defence lawyer's argument that Hushpuppi was paid by designer brands for promotion has set the stage for what promises to be a long trial in American courts.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) accuses Mr Abbas, 37, of conspiring to launder hundreds of millions of dollars from frauds known as Business Email Compromise (BEC) and other scams.
Did the US act legally?
It is the latest high-profile fraud case involving a Nigerian national in the United States but his lawyer says the US had no authority to transport him from Dubai.
"In my opinion, the FBI and the government here acted illegally when they kidnapped him from Dubai without any legal process to do so," Mr Pissetzky told the BBC.
"There was no extradition, there were no legal steps taken, there were no court documents filed, it was simply a call to the FBI. He is not a citizen of the United States, the US had absolutely no authority to take him," his lawyer says.
But the Dubai police said in a Facebook post that the FBI director had thanked them for extraditing the two men.
"You'll have to ask them about why they called it an extradition," the US Department of Justice (DoJ) spokesman responded in an email.
In a statement about Mr Abbas' initial court appearance, the DoJ said "FBI special agents earlier this week obtained custody of Abbas and brought him to the United States" without giving any further details.
Mr Pissetzky is not convinced.
"If Dubai wanted to expel him, they should have expelled him back to Nigeria. I've never heard of anything like that. That is the real story here."

Culled from BBC

That is a photo he took on the 17th day of April.

Flexherbal:
I do not understand

he is doing his job, he knows that his client is going to strike a deal and get a little jail time AND give up a of bulk of the funds he stole back to the FBI, he is just earning his bones, playing his part of the drama, the way nigerians think of american legal system works is about to unravel right b4 their eyes e go funny die

many people want him jailed till he grows white hair america likes that our people do fraud, it favors them, cause it gives them excuse to reject us and give us a bad name so their companies dont invest here, no country likes money leaving their soil

if u over do, they will arrest you, if america wanted to catch all the scammers in nigeria this year, they can, wetin our boys sabi pass dating or hacking mails, go read scam wen american scammers they do and bow down

HushPopping!!!....... You just have to lie to get sympathy...But those white folks hate you for stealing from them and your sympathy means nothing...



Hush is going to last there for 20years for now... and pretty soon, hush story will slide out... So what's next??

iamJ:
he is doing his job, he knows that his client is going to strike a deal and get a little jail time AND give up a of bulk of the funds he stole back to the FBI, he is just earning his bones, playing his part of the drama, the way nigerians think of american legal system is about to unravel right b4 their eyes e go funny die

many people want him jailed till he grows white hair america likes that our people do fraud, it favors them, cause it gives them excuse to reject us and give us a bad name so their companies dont invest here, no country likes money leaving their soil

you think the US would rather let this criminal go free (so more yahoo-yahoo continue defraud their citizen) OR make an example of Hushpuppet?!?

MrBrownJay1:


you think the US would rather let this criminal go free (so more yahoo-yahoo continue defraud their citizen) OR make an example of Hushpuppet?!?

example , hush isnt the biggest scammer ever, just that he over did he show offs and got noticed, they will take the money from him and send him to jail briefly, how much is lost to fraud a year? how much is lost to nigeria if companies comes and invest here? go check e go shock you, investment is more scary than fraud, fraud discourages investment, investment is the main thing u want to stop, if nigeria gets better, will we go to their schools? will we import their goods? know how much facebook makes a year from nigeria?

Reading the purported lawyer's statements, it almost feels like the lawyer is trolling hushpuppi

Which kain weak defense be this? Anyway man must wack

Even the lawyer go laugh belle tear when e dey alone think about this him defense

Charge and bail defense

iamJ:
example , hush isnt the biggest scammer ever, just that he over did he show offs and got noticed, they will take the money from him and send him to jail briefly, how much is lost to fraud a year? how much is lost to nigeria if companies comes and invest here? go check e go shock you, investment is more scary than fraud, fraud discourages investment, investment is the main thing u want to stop, if nigeria gets better, will we go to their schools? will we import their goods? know how much facebook makes a year from nigeria?

yes, they had to shut him down because he made a mockery out of the US by flaunting his ill gotten loot on social media for all to see, and promoted the yahoo-yahoo lifestyle to the poor/greedy masses. the dude HAD to be stopped... he (and his associate) is by far the biggest NIGERIAN scammer... (unless you want to compare him with them polithieves and polilooters!)

iamJ:
he is doing his job, he knows that his client is going to strike a deal and get a little jail time AND give up a of bulk of the funds he stole back to the FBI, he is just earning his bones, playing his part of the drama, the way nigerians think of american legal system works is about to unravel right b4 their eyes e go funny die

many people want him jailed till he grows white hair america likes that our people do fraud, it favors them, cause it gives them excuse to reject us and give us a bad name so their companies dont invest here, no country likes money leaving their soil

if u over do, they will arrest you, if america wanted to catch all the scammers in nigeria this year, they can, wetin our boys sabi pass dating or hacking mails, go read scam wen american scammers they do and bow down

Wishful thinking at its peak. This isn't about a criminal stealing a few hundreds of dollars from random online women. He messed up millions of lives and mocked USA for it. I hope you know that a Nigerian internet fraudster has once bagged over a hundred years in jail term?

Your Hushpuppy is a goner

abduljabbar4:
Wishful thinking at its peak. This isn't about a criminal stealing a few hundreds of dollars from random online women. He messed up millions of lives and mocked USA for it. I hope you know that a Nigerian internet fraudster has once bagged over a hundred years in jail term?

Your Hushpuppy is a goner

well said...
Rasaq Aderoju Raheem, 115yrs sentence
Oladimeji Seun Ayelotan, 95yrs sentence

... and they were also picked up from some foreign land before being brought to the US to face justice.