By Patrick Idowu
Sapphire Egemasi, a Nigerian tech enthusiast, faces a potential prison sentence of more than 20 years in the United States following her arrest by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
She was taken into custody in connection with a large scale fraud scheme targeting several US government agencies.
Egemasi, a programmer who operates a Devpost account, was arrested around April 10, 2025, in Bronx, New York, along with other co conspirators including Samuel Kwadwo Osei, believed to have led the syndicate.
Their arrest follows a federal grand jury indictment filed in 2024 charging them with multiple counts of internet fraud and money laundering for crimes committed between September 2021 and February 2023.
Egemasi and her Ghanaian co defendants allegedly conspired to defraud the city of Kentucky of millions of dollars.
Investigators say her role involved designing fake websites that impersonated official US government domains to steal login credentials and facilitate the transfer of stolen funds.
Before her arrest, Egemasi was reportedly based in Cambridge in the United Kingdom, although authorities believe she previously lived in Ghana where she likely established ties with her co conspirators.
She allegedly acted as the syndicate’s tech lead, overseeing the creation of fraudulent websites and managing wire transfers to accounts controlled by the group.
Text message records indicate that in August 2022, the syndicate rerouted nine hundred and sixty five thousand dollars stolen from Kentucky into a PNC Bank account.
In a separate transaction at around the same time, three hundred and thirty thousand dollars was funneled into an account with Bank of America.
To hide the source of her wealth, Egemasi reportedly claimed to have held multiple roles mostly internships at major multinational companies including British Petroleum, H&M and Zara.
Widely known online as the ‘tech queen’, Egemasi cultivated a polished digital persona, especially on LinkedIn where she showcased her skills and flaunted a luxurious lifestyle.
Her social media profiles featured photos of lavish vacations to destinations such as Greece and Portugal, funded according to prosecutors by illicit proceeds.
Egemasi and her co accused remain in federal custody and are being held pending trial in Lexington, Kentucky.
If convicted, each faces up to twenty years in prison, significant financial penalties and eventual deportation to their home countries after serving their sentences.