A United States District Court has found a Nigerian lawyer based in Los Angeles, Paulinus Okoronkwo, guilty of receiving a $2.1 million bribe from a Chinese oil company to influence drilling rights in Nigeria.
Okoronkwo, 58, popularly known as “Pollie,” was convicted on three counts of money laundering, one count of tax evasion, and one count of obstruction of justice. The verdict was delivered on August 29 after a four-day trial in California.
Prosecutors told the court that in October 2015, while serving as General Manager of the upstream division of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC, now NNPC Ltd.), Okoronkwo collected the bribe from Addax Petroleum, a Swiss subsidiary of Chinese state-owned oil giant Sinopec.
The $2.1 million was wired to a trust account in the name of his Los Angeles law firm, disguised as payment for legal consultancy.
“The agreement was nothing more than a sham to conceal a bribe,” prosecutors argued, noting that Addax was seeking to protect crude oil drilling rights in Nigeria worth billions of dollars.
Evidence also revealed that Addax fired executives who questioned the transaction and lied during an audit to cover up the deal.
Investigators showed that in November 2017, Okoronkwo used $983,200 from the illicit funds as a down payment for a house in Valencia, California. He also failed to declare the payment on his 2015 tax returns.
In 2022, when questioned by federal agents, he claimed the money belonged to a client and was not his income, an assertion prosecutors proved false.
US District Judge John F. Walter has fixed December 1 for sentencing. Okoronkwo faces:
- Up to 10 years in prison for each money laundering count
- Up to 10 years for obstruction of justice
- Up to five years for tax evasion
This could total a statutory maximum of 35 years.
For now, Okoronkwo remains free on a $50,000 bond.
The case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the IRS Criminal Investigation, with backing from the Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs.
The prosecution team included Assistant US Attorneys Alexander Schwab, Deputy Chief of the Criminal Division Nisha Chandran, and Alexander Su of the Asset Forfeiture and Recovery Section.
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