Judge closes sentencing of man guilty of identity theft
Without offering an explanation to the public, U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt sealed a hearing Wednesday to determine the sentence of a man who used bogus credit cards and fake identification to steal money from the accounts of about 20 victims.
Former University of Nevada, Las Vegas student Kingsley Osemwengie, 21, signed a plea deal in September, admitting he is guilty of conspiracy to commit identity theft, bank fraud and to make, utter and pass counterfeit securities.
Osemwengie’s attorney, Tom Pitaro, requested that the sentencing hearing be closed to the public. Hunt agreed and excluded the media. Osemwengie’s family was allowed to remain for the proceedings.
Neither the government nor Pitaro explained why news media were kicked out of the courtroom. Judges are typically required to give an explanation. Because the case is sealed, it is unknown whether Hunt levied a prison term for Osemwengie, who was in custody Wednesday.
Osemwengie and 15 co-conspirators were indicted in January 2006. According to the U.S. attorney’s office, Osemwengie was one of the architects of a scheme to defraud bank customers throughout the Las Vegas Valley.
Under his direction, three co-defendants who worked at different Las Vegas banks accessed customers’ bank accounts and passed the confidential information to Osemwengie. According to the indictment, Osemwengie then used equipment to produce false identification cards bearing the names of the true account holders, but with his photograph. Armed with the bogus documents, he illicitly accessed the bank accounts.
The indictment says Osemwengie and his co-defendants used the fake identification and debit cards to obtain 63 post office money orders totaling $57,863. They also purchased thousands of dollars in merchandise. The total amount of money stolen exceeded $75,000, the indictment says.
Osemwengie was also charged with using “skimming” equipment at businesses to steal credit card information. Skimming is done by stealing the magnetic information from bank cards through the use of a “wedge” or other equipment, the indictment says.
The stolen account numbers were entered into a computer so they could be re-encoded onto cards possessed by the co-defendants, according to court documents.
The conspiracy began at an Al Phillips Dry Cleaners store, where co-defendants Gary McKelvey, Samik Kapadia and Juwon Aragbaye worked. Co-defendant Lisa Perry worked at Bank of America, defendant Muhammad Ali worked at Wells Fargo Bank, and defendant Omar Richardson worked at Nevada State Bank.
All the defendants in the case signed a group plea deal.