A United States district court has ordered the interim forfeiture of a property in California linked to Paulinus Okoronkwo, a former general manager of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), now NNPC Limited, who was convicted for accepting a $2.1 million bribe from Addax Petroleum.
In September, the court found Okoronkwo guilty of transactional money laundering, tax evasion, and obstruction of justice. Prosecutors said that while serving as NNPC’s upstream division general manager, he abused his office by accepting the payment from Addax Petroleum, a Switzerland-based subsidiary of China’s state-owned Sinopec, to secure favorable drilling rights in Nigeria.
The $2.1 million, wired in October 2015 to a Los Angeles law firm’s trust account controlled by Okoronkwo, was disguised as payment for consultancy services but was in fact a bribe. According to prosecutors, Addax executives falsified internal records to mask the transaction as legal fees, dismissed employees who raised concerns, and misled auditors about the nature of the payment.
Okoronkwo, who also practiced immigration, family, and personal injury law in Koreatown, Los Angeles, reportedly used nearly $1 million of the illicit funds as a down payment on a home in Valencia, California, while failing to declare the income in his 2015 tax filings.
US District Judge John Walter has scheduled December 1 for Okoronkwo’s sentencing hearing.
The Forfeiture Order
Court documents show that on October 3, the judge granted the US government’s forfeiture application against Okoronkwo’s property located at 25340 Twin Oaks Place, Valencia, California 91381.
“For the reasons set out below, any right, title, and interest of the defendant in the following described property (hereinafter, the ‘Forfeitable Property’) is hereby forfeited to the United States,” the court order reads.
“The Court finds that the government has established the requisite nexus between the Forfeitable Property and the offenses described in Counts 1 through 3 of the First Superseding Indictment, which charged defendant with violating 18 U.S.C. § 1957 (transactional money laundering).”
“The Forfeitable Property is more particularly described as: i. The net proceeds of the sale of the real property located at 25340 Twin Oaks Place, Valencia, California 91381, more particularly described as Tract Number 45433, Lot 12, with Assessor’s Parcel Number 2826-143-004 (Consolidated Asset Identification System Number 24-FBI-001775) (‘Forfeitable Property’).”
“Upon the entry of this Order, and pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 32.2(b)(3) and 21 U.S.C. § 853, the United States Attorney General (or a designee) is authorized to seize the Forfeitable Property.”
The court further directed the US government to publish a public notice inviting any individual with a legal interest in the forfeited property to show cause within 60 days.
The case underscores ongoing US efforts to trace and recover assets linked to foreign corruption involving Nigerian oil officials and international energy firms.
