Nigerian Brothers Plead Guilty In Sexual Extortion Ring Linked To Teen's Suicide

Two brothers from Nigeria pleaded guilty Wednesday to their roles in an international sex extortion scheme linked to the 2022 suicide of a 17-year-old boy in Michigan.

Samuel and Samson Ogoshi are facing a maximum of 30 years in prison for conspiring to sexually exploit teenage boys in the United Statesby posing as a young woman online,U.S. Attorney Mark Totten announced.

According to the announcement and thebrothers’ plea agreement, one of their victims was Jordan DeMay, a high school student in Marquette Township, Michigan, who died by suicide in 2022 after he was manipulated into sending them sexually explicit images of himself.

DeMay’s death sparked a joint investigation by the FBI and local law enforcement that ultimately led authorities to the Ogoshi brothers, The Associated Press reported last year.

The brothers allegedly worked with a third man, Ezekiel Robert, who is fighting an extradition order in Nigeria, according to the statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Michigan.

The plea agreement alleges the brothers worked with Robert from February 2021 through at least January 2023 to purchase hacked Instagram accounts to contact teenage boys and young men.

The scheme involved one person chatting with a victim while another researched personal information about the victim online, including their address, school and the identities of their friends and family, according to the plea agreement.

The victim would eventually be manipulated into producing and sharing sexually explicit images or videos of themselves, according to the plea agreement. Once a victim sent the sexually explicit content, the men would allegedly use the images to blackmail them into sending money.

Prosecutors