A 300 level student of the department of agriculture, faculty of agriculture in the University of Ilorin Olaoye Akanbi Favour popularly known as Jasper, has allegedly defrauded his colleagues and friends in an alleged investment deal to the tune of 300 million naira.
The allegation broke to the public space late Saturday night through the social media circulation of the alleged fraudster's summary information into his fraudulence activities.
According to the circulated information which majorly featured on most WhatsApp group chats of many students, Olaoye had claimed to be an expert in Forex Trading, the charade he sold to his victims to lure them into the said investment deal.
"A self-acclaimed forex trader expert who supposedly has great knowledge of the financial market. He persuaded his investors - mainly his course mates and friends - to invest their money with him with an agreed weekly percentage. He gave them the assurance that forex is not a Ponzi scheme and that he had backup funds, much enough to pay every one of his investors their capitals and profits even if things went wrong.
Things went wrong in June and he promised to pay everyone's capital before December. It has been six months and he has refused to communicate with his investors on the situation of things and how payments will be made. It was later learnt that he conspired with one Mr Eseka Gospel (ECG investment) to dupe his investors - course mates and friends - of their money, estimated to be over 300 million (naira).", the circulated chat read.
In a further investigation, interesting facts have emerged as regard to his studentship with the university and his fraudulent activities. According to our findings, the Olaoye was once a faculty parliament. He contested for the position of the faculty Public Relation Officer in the 2019 student union election. He however withdrew from the race for the reason best known to him.
The student-fraudster was also said to be someone with an opulent lifestyle. According to many story accounts by his coursemates, Jasper (Olaoye) was said to be fond of flaunting affluence on the social media pages.
How the Investment deal started - Victims recount
According to many recounts by the victims, the investiment deal with Jasper started a few weeks before the covid-19 pandemic, specifically, to some of them, it all started around February, while some claimed they started dealing with him mid April.
Jasper had met his victims individually to sell the idea to them. "It all started in April when he told me about an investment with zero risk. I asked him if he was sure and he said 'yes'", a victim simply referred to as Rey, swindled a whopping sum of 2 million naira, recounted.
To Tolulope, the alleged fraudster had approached him in February to sell the gospel of the deal to him. "...because I know his character, I first called him to ask if he was the one behind the rampant cases of hacking of WhatsApp accounts. He said he was the one and that nothing can happen, especially as regard the funds that he had backup money. I then invested with him. And till June everything was going well."
Also according to another victim by name Philip, "He told us that he would return our capital if anything goes wrong. By June he went to Akure where he was arrested alongside one guy, Eseka Chukwu Gospel. After he was released, the following day he came online. He told us our money was safe and he was "going to start payment but that day he was tired so everyone had no option but to relax. The following day he came up with bank issues. He had told us that his personal account was frozen before he was arrested and he didn't want to go to Lagos to complain.
"But because we all know he's our coursemate. Nobody thought this could happen. But the following week he said what he said, he bought a car.
"He later told us that it was the guy with whom he was arrested at Akure that was trading and not him and if the guy failed to be released from police custody, payment would not start. The guy spent about 20days in the police cell in Akure after which he got transferred to Abuja because the inspector general of police was interested in the case due to different petitions written against him from FUTA students.
"The day the guy was released, he did an Instagram live video stating that he was supposed to make the payment on Friday but due to his frozen bank account we should wait for another two weeks so he could settle everything.
"After waiting another two weeks, now in August, the guy posted online stated he was going to the station. He claimed his account had not been opened. And since then Jasper has been ghosting us. Later he came only to tell us he had started generating money.
"But since September, he has not been online at all. We later found out that the other guy's account has been open but there is no fund in it at all. Even when he knew we found out, Jasper didn't not make a comment making it look like it was all a planned work. We also found that his own bank account was not frozen.
In fact right now, they are just playing us. We are left in the middle. The only option we have now is to make it public", Philip who claims his 320 thousand is about to be lost to the saga narrated his ordeal.
The ordeal was not in any way different from other victim's narration, to Tominsin, "He told us that he was a forex trader. But due to the fact that we all his colleagues, we trusted him so much that we only not invested with me, we went further to get people's money to invest, all in the name of him being into forex trading meanwhile it was a scam. He told us he had a backup fund in case there were problems. He was ready to refund everyone's money. For the first couple of weeks, it all went well but all of sudden, he stopped paying people. The initial agreement was 25% of the amount of the capital invested and after 7 days you'll receive the 25 percentage of what you invested.
"Along the lines, he stopped paying; we asked what the problems were, he started lying to us. Today, Bank issues, tomorrow, they freeze his account, next tomorrow police issue. Then after all this, what about the backup fund, then he ghosted us. People from other faculties also invested. We have been on this since June, up till now no good update from him", he narrated.
In spite of his owning up to some of his victims prior to the deal that he is a serial WhatsApp page hacker, the revelation did not stop them from going ahead to invest with him. Even when he told them their funds were secured.
According to varying accounts, the initial starting up capitals and the expected returns in the investments varied. However, according to an account, the interest rate initially stood at 30% but after seven days, he reduced it to 25%. And this was around April.
Although, in the course of our findings, according to many recounted ordeals, a unified tone was that the investment was going on smoothly till June when he stopped paying. "This gives the notion that the investment shipwrecked started in June.
Your money is safe in my account- Jasper had told his clients
In a series of voice notes sent to the group of his investors, Adeoye had assured them that their money is safe in his account. However the problem he was encountering is how to withdraw the money from the said account as the bank would allow him.
I have been traveling a lot nowadays...your money is safe - there is nothing wrong with your money. It is in my account. But to remove the money is the problem. They are not allowing me to remove money from the account. Maybe the banks are using my money to invest or using it to generate money for themselves, I dont know. I have filled so many forms, yet they havent released my money.
"The plan now is, for this week, nobody should send money to me. I don't need your money. Your money that is with me is in my account, safe and sound. You can only reinvest your money for this week which you calculate as 15% next week. From next week, I will start paying everybody off. If I can make it in a week, if it will be in two week, I'll start paying off.
"I'll go on a break for a week or a month to reshuffle myself. I'm processing my CAC to make it legit because I don't know why they are disturbing me. They said I am too young to have that kind of money in my account. So for now I'll just try to regenerate new money. The money in my account I won't use it for now. I'll look for a way to regenerate money to pay." Jasper in a series of VNs sent to the 'investors group' had reassured his clients.
In another VN, he claimed that he had enough to pay everybody. However, his UBA account is frozen. But he had a backup plan in Keystone Bank and the money in it is enough to pay everybody. The issues however with it is that he didn't have the bank's debit card.
"And when I opted for slip, they (bank) say I can't remove more than five million per day because it's a savings account. Not only that, I can't still move the money to another bank except within their Bank...because of this I have been able to stay a week long in a street, I have been moving from one place to another"
But this series of assurance did not go down well with the 'investors'. Speaking with our correspondent, they feared that the whole scheme might have crashed and he probably did not want to tell them. They alleged that he was telling lies in the voice note.
"He claimed he had converted the money to crypto so the police won't have access to it. He was arrested around June. He promised to pay in August, yet he did not pay. He blocked my number and I can't get to him since October", Tolulope Who claimed his money was well above 1 million recounted.
Hameed, another victim, while recounting his loss said: "It's been six months and he has refused to communicate with his investors on the situation of things and how payment will be made. It was later learnt that he conspired with one Mr Eseka Gospel (ECG INVESTMENT) to dupe his investors of their money...all efforts to retrieve our money proved useless"
Jasper bought car during pandemic
Another unified tune amongst the victim is the allegation that Jasper purportedly bought a car valued '5.6 million' during the Covid-19 pandemic. This to many of the victims came after he had told them his bank account was frozen. According to them, buying of a car in the midst of the saga was indication of his unwillingness to refund them their investment money. "Nobody thought this could happen. But the following week he said what he said, he bought a car.", another victim recounted.
Meanwhile attempt by correspondent to get Jasper to react to the allegation proved abortive as messages sent to his cellphone was not replied to even as the message prompted delivery mark. A call to his cellphone through a number Caller ID App simply captioned 'Jasper Favour' were at first two dials unattended to and subsequent dials were not reachable. The chat sent to his WhatsApp page has not delivered as at the time of filing this report.
