The 62-year-old traditional ruler pleaded for leniency, stating that the fraud was a departure from his previous life of service and responsibility.
Oba Oloyede was arrested in May 2024 after disappearing from Nigeria two months earlier. He was accused of using six companies to file fraudulent loan applications under the US Paycheck Protection Programme and Economic Injury Disaster Loan schemes.
Court records show that Oba Oloyede, who migrated to the US in the late 1990s, had a respectable career as a banker and adjunct professor before returning to Nigeria in 2019 to assume the throne.
Prosecutors revealed that part of the fraud proceeds were laundered through personal and business accounts, leading to the seizure of a Medina County property and over $96,000 from one of his company’s bank accounts.
Oba Oloyede was granted bail after surrendering his US and Nigerian passports and remains under court restrictions pending sentencing, scheduled for August 26, 2025.
