Alleged Nigerian cyber fraudster, Ramon Abbas, known online as “Hushpuppi” and “The Billionaire Gucci Master” was denied bail during a hearing on Monday in Chicago. He was told by the judge that he will remain in custody until his trial later this year over money laundering and other criminal offences allegations.

At a detention hearing, the court in its ruling added that Abbas will be transported to Los Angeles by the U.S. Marshals Service, and will that he will not be allowed to stay with his girlfriend’s uncle in Homewood, Illinois. His trial is to be heard in Los Angeles, California where the case was filed. The investigations were however initially being handled in Chicago.

Abbas’ lawyer denied that his client was a flight risk or a danger to the community, all through the hearing. He repeatedly interjected and rejected the allegations made against his client by the FBI’s affidavit posted earlier this month. But as it appeared, he was unable to convince the courts.

The FBI’s primary charge against Hushpuppi is that he was part of a network that made “hundreds of millions of dollars” from corporate email cloning and hacking frauds and other scams.

The courts were consistently persuaded by the Assistant United States Attorney, Melody Wells, a prosecutor in the Chicago district attorney’s office, that Abbas is a flight risk. The Attorney further referred to his “significant” financial assets, and deep ties to foreign countries” adding to his lack of strong ties to the United States. Wells said that all of these gave Abbas the needed recipe to flee from the charges levelled against him.

Ramon Abbas via his lawyer’s submission was seeking to live with a girlfriend’s relative in Illinois, but this was queried by the prosecutor, arguing that Mr. Abbas had up to this point of his arrest “never visited” the girlfriend or their child in the United States. Wells said that: “There is no evidence that he has ever even met this ‘uncle,’ who would be the third-party custodian under these circumstances.”

In the court’s ruling, it said that there was more than enough justification to see to it that the U.S. Marshall takes Hushpuppi to California as soon as possible to answer for the cases against him there. The court said in its ruling that that the accused had “a great incentive not to continue to respond to these proceedings here,” as he is “facing a long sentence.”

The court also acknowledged the risks that in addition to holding passports to other countries (Saint Kitts and Nevis), Hushpuppi has access to a lot of assets and ready cash. This is evidenced by his lavish lifestyle, including being able to pay $10,000 a month as rent for his apartment in Dubai, as such he was denied bail and would rather continue his case under detainment.

Source; https://africaatrandom.com/hushpuppi-denied-bail-application/