FBI Moves to Seize Lagos Yahoo Boy’s Assets Over Trump Inauguration Scam
Enet
The FBI has filed a civil case to take control of property owned by Lagos-based scammer Ehiremen Aigbokhan. He is accused of stealing over ₦460 million in cryptocurrency meant for Donald Trump’s 2025 inauguration.
Court documents show Aigbokhan and others used a scam called Business Email Compromise (BEC). They pretended to be the Trump-Vance Inaugural Committee to trick donors into sending money. The scammers created fake emails that looked official but were designed to steal funds.
One example occurred on December 26, 2024. A donor received an email from a fake address, @t47lnaugu***.com. The email closely resembled the real @t47inaug***.com used by a committee co-chair, Steve Witkoff. The donor sent over 250,300 USDT.ETH, worth more than ₦400 million, to the scammers’ crypto wallet.
Within days, most of these funds—about 215,000 USDT.ETH—were moved to different crypto wallets. The FBI contacted Tether, a crypto company, to freeze the money. Tether did so on December 31.
Investigators tracked the scam activity back to Aigbokhan’s Binance account. It was created in October 2024 and had no deposits until the scam. Forensic work also tied fake email accounts and IP addresses from Lagos to Aigbokhan, confirming his involvement.
The FBI has recovered more than ₦60 million in cryptocurrency from two wallets linked to him. An assistant U.S. attorney, Rick Blaylock Jr., asked the court to approve the seizure of these assets.
An arrest warrant is also being issued for Aigbokhan. The charges include cryptocurrency fraud and money laundering.
