Nigerian Drug Dealer Ordered To Return N24M Made From Drug Smuggling In UK

After being sentenced to seven years in prison in 2012, Unaka was last week ordered to return almost £90,000 from profits he made while he was selling drugs. 

A jailed Nigerian drug dealer in the UK, Afamdi Maduabuch Unaka, has been ordered to pay back almost £900,000 of his profits from the sales of cocaine and money laundering. 

Unaka was arrested in June 2012 in central Croydon in the UK after police got a tip-off that he was involved in money laundering. £10, 000 cash was found with him while a further search at his residence exposed 86 packets of cocaine in a wardrobe in his bedroom. The cocaine weighed 1.3kg and was worth the estimated sum of £260,000.

After being charged to court with possession with intent to supply class A drugs, Unaka pleaded guilty to the offence, but claimed that he had found the drugs in a park and was not further involved in the drugs trade or dealing.

A Newton hearing was held in October 2012 and the judge concluded Unaka played a leading role in the drug trade, but that he was essentially working on his own behalf and not for an organised criminal network and sentenced him to seven years imprisonment.

Following his conviction, officers from the Met’s Criminal Finance Team began to investigate Unaka’s finances under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, with a view to confiscating any assets gained through his criminal activity. 

They seized statements and evidence at his home address and discovered that he held various off-shore bank accounts in Jersey, as well as evidence of overseas balance transfers to the USA, Nigeria and Peru.

The financial investigation, which lasted several months, found in the six years leading up to his arrest Unaka had made just over £1,000,000 from criminal activity. 

At the end of the confiscation hearing Unaka was ordered to repay just under £900,000, due to be retrieved from his accounts based in the UK or abroad. The £10,000 that was seized by police has also been confiscated as part of this.

Unaka has six months to pay the money back or face five years further imprisonment.