Overview
- The Justice Department filed and served a civil denaturalization complaint on March 18 in U.S. District Court in Baltimore against Emmanuel Oluwatosin Kazeem.
- The complaint alleges Kazeem’s naturalization was unlawful because he concealed criminal activity surrounding a yearslong fraud scheme and entered a sham marriage to gain permanent residency.
- Court evidence links Kazeem to 10,139 fraudulent federal tax returns that sought more than $91 million and obtained over $11.6 million, using personal data from over 259,000 victims and more than 91,000 identities he bought from a hacker.
- Investigators say proceeds funded Maryland real estate purchases and thousands of wire transfers to Nigeria exceeding $2.1 million, and that he attempted a $6 million hotel project in Lagos.
- Kazeem was convicted in 2017 and later sentenced to 15 years with over $12 million in restitution; President Biden commuted his sentence on Dec. 12, 2024, and the new civil case will be litigated by the Civil Division’s Affirmative Litigation Unit with DHS HSI support.