Two Nigerian men arrested in Nigeria three years ago have been extradited to the United States to face federal charges over alleged financially motivated sextortion schemes targeting American minors.
Adebola Festus Adekunle, 26, from Lagos, and Mudasiru Afeez Olawale, 24, were taken into US custody on August 27 after being arrested in Nigeria in August 2023 during Operation Artemis, an FBI-led investigation into sextortion networks operating from Nigeria.
The US Department of Justice said the suspects are facing separate federal cases in Mississippi and North Carolina involving the alleged sexual exploitation and extortion of minors. Prosecutors said both cases include victims whose deaths were linked to the alleged sextortion schemes.
Adekunle appeared before a federal court in Oxford, Mississippi. He faces charges including sexual exploitation of a minor resulting in death, production of child sexual abuse material, coercion and enticement of a minor, and interstate threats intended to extort.
Olawale was arraigned in Greensboro, North Carolina, where he faces charges including sexual exploitation of minors resulting in death, enticement of minors, interstate threatening communications and distribution of child sexual abuse material.
If convicted, both men face maximum penalties of life imprisonment. The sexual exploitation resulting in death charges carry a mandatory minimum sentence of 30 years in prison.
US authorities said Operation Artemis involved FBI agents, analysts and forensic specialists working in Nigeria to identify and apprehend members of networks allegedly targeting American teenagers. The wider investigation linked financially motivated sextortion schemes to dozens of teenage deaths by suicide, according to the FBI.
US Attorney General Todd Blanche said American law-enforcement agencies had strengthened international partnerships to disrupt criminal networks involved in child exploitation. FBI Director Kash Patel also pointed to the extradition as evidence that suspects operating outside the US could still be pursued. “They’ve been overseas for three years, but this FBI and our DOJ partners went and got them,” Patel said.
The US Justice Department credited Nigerian authorities, including the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, the Federal Ministry of Justice’s International Criminal Justice Cooperation Department and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), for assisting with the extradition process.
The cases highlight the international nature of financially motivated sextortion, in which perpetrators use threats, manipulation or intimate material to demand money or additional sexual content from victims. US authorities have warned that international borders will not protect suspects from prosecution, while stressing that the allegations against Adekunle and Olawale remain unproven and that both men are presumed innocent unless convicted in court.
