Man pleads guilty to role in widespread romance scam

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A St. Louis County man has pleaded guilty to helping Nigerian romance scammers bilk women in 25 states out of hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash and electronics. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that 43-year-old Bonmene Sibe of Jennings pleaded guilty Wednesday to a federal conspiracy charge. He was one of three people indicted last year. All three have now pleaded guilty. One of them, Ovuoke Frank Ofikoro, said in his July guilty plea that co-conspirators in Nigeria and the U.S. stole the identities of U.S. military officers or created fictitious officers’ identities before tricking women into sending cash or electronics.