FBI kidnapped Hushpuppi from Dubai, says US lawyer

A Nigerian man accused of multimillion-dollar fraud and money laundering by the United States was kidnapped by the FBI from Dubai, his lawyer says.



Ramon Olorunwa Abbas - known to his 2.5 million Instagram followers as Ray Hushpuppi - and another cyber-heist suspect Olalekan Jacob Ponle (aka Mr Woodberry) were arrested in Dubai, where tA complaint against him filed in court accuses Mr Abbas of leading a transnational network of cybercriminals whose targets included a US law firm, a foreign bank and an English Premier League football club.



Email scams typically try to steal an individual's personal information, or to defraud them by impersonating a legitimate business contact and tricking the target into sending money into a wrong account.



They're sometimes called 419 scams, after the relevant article in the Nigerian Criminal Code.hey lived, in June.



They then appeared in a Chicago court on 3 July.



The United Arab Emirates has no extradition treaty with the United States but Dubai police said they had been extradited to the US.



A spokesman for the US Department of Justice told the BBC that Hushpuppi was expelled from Dubai and was not extradited. He did not answer how he ended up in US custody.



Mr Abbas' lawyer Gal Pissetzky told the BBC that his client, who posts on Instagram about his extravagant lifestyle, was not a criminal and had made his money legitimately.









"He is a social media influencer with millions of followers, with millions of people that respect and loved him, and he loved them, and that's what he did. In today's society, that's a business," he said.



Mr Pissetzky admits that he is not "100% familiar" with social media and his children consider him too old but he knows "that's how people make money today".



A Nigerian man accused of multimillion-dollar fraud and money laundering by the United States was kidnapped by the FBI from Dubai, his lawyer says.



Ramon Olorunwa Abbas - known to his 2.5 million Instagram followers as Ray Hushpuppi - and another cyber-heist suspect Olalekan Jacob Ponle (aka Mr Woodberry) were arrested in Dubai, where they lived, in June.



They then appeared in a Chicago court on 3 July.



The United Arab Emirates has no extradition treaty with the United States but Dubai police said they had been extradited to the US.



A spokesman for the US Department of Justice told the BBC that Hushpuppi was expelled from Dubai and was not extradited. He did not answer how he ended up in US custody.



Mr Abbas' lawyer Gal Pissetzky told the BBC that his client, who posts on Instagram about his extravagant lifestyle, was not a criminal and had made his money legitimately.



"He is a social media influencer with millions of followers, with millions of people that respect and loved him, and he loved them, and that's what he did. In today's society, that's a business," he said.









Mr Pissetzky admits that he is not "100% familiar" with social media and his children consider him too old but he knows "that's how people make money today".



Ray Hushpuppi was already popular on Instagram for his luxurious lifestyle documented exhaustively on his page but he has gained another 100,000 followers since his dramatic arrest.



At the time, Dubai police said they recovered $40m (£32m) in cash, 13 luxury cars worth $6.8m, 21 computers, 47 smartphones and the addresses of nearly two million alleged victims .



A complaint against him filed in court accuses Mr Abbas of leading a transnational network of cybercriminals whose targets included a US law firm, a foreign bank and an English Premier League football club.



Email scams typically try to steal an individual's personal information, or to defraud them by impersonating a legitimate business contact and tricking the target into sending money into a wrong account.



They're sometimes called 419 scams, after the relevant article in the Nigerian Criminal Code.

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