This was made known on Monday following the conclusion of a separate trial involving former Reading and Nigeria footballer Sam Sodje, 39.
Sam was cleared of money laundering charges.
The fraud trial, which began in 2017 had heard how the family set up the Sodje Sports Foundation (SSF) in 2009, ostensibly to help provide facilities in Nigeria.
However, cash raised at black-tie dinners, auctions, charity football matches and a clay pigeon shoot went into Sodje bank accounts, prosecutor Julian Christopher QC said.
In once instance, in 2011, there was a gala dinner at the Lowry Hotel in Manchester for the SSF and the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital.
The £150-a-head black-tie event raised almost £11,500, but Mr Christopher said “not a penny” went to the hospital.
Judge Michael Topolski QC told the defendants: “You have brought shame to your family. At least £63,000 can been shown to have been received by the fund.”
He added that the £63,000 did not include cash donations.
“The defendants went out of their way to ensure that proper records were not kept. Any good works done in the past would be forever tainted by their dishonest and disreputable conduct,” the Judge added.
Stephen Sodje, of Bexley, was sentenced to two years and six months in prison for receiving £30,000 in charity funds.
Efe Sodje, of Cheadle in Greater Manchester, who was “the face” of the charity, was given 18 months in jail for receiving £7,500 from the SSF and an unknown amount from a clay pigeon shooting event.
Bright Sodje, of Sale in Greater Manchester, was jailed for 21 months for receiving £3,000 from the charity and signing cheques to other family members totalling £18,000.
Efe Sodje was cleared of money laundering at the Old Bailey in January 2018 but Emmanuel Ehikhamen, 53, of south-east London, and Andrew Oruma, 50, of Bexley, south London, were convicted.
The case against Sam Sodje collapsed and his retrial began on 7 January 2019.
Mr Sodje, who also played for Charlton Athletic, Brentford and Leeds United during his career, was charged with four counts of taking part in a fraud in which bank accounts were used to channel money from companies around the world.
He was found not guilty of two of the charges on 14 January and cleared of the remaining two counts earlier on Monday.
Another of the brothers, Akpo Sodje, 37, was implicated but moved to Dubai and refused to return to Britain for questioning.
from dailypost.
*You see?Jailed in the UK for doing what Nigerian celebs are doing back home and walking free and splashing expensive things bought with proceeds from charities on the internet!!!................
What a pity!!!
Chai! You don't mess up in a system that works
ReplyDeleteFantastically corrupt brothers
DeleteI tell you
DeleteForget that thing Stella. Did Hilary Clinton not make away with over $4 billion dollars meant for the renovation, refurbishment, stabilizing Haiti? Diverted the monies to her foundation. Known case but nothing has been done. Many of them like her made away with public funds and charities. Sodje and his brothers’ case is just one that failed for them. The law, many a times, is just selective in some of these countries.
DeleteJust like that father, it runs in the family. Is it not their father that went to jail too for throwing a white man into burning furnace abi fire in the same UK.
DeleteSuch laws should be properly executed here in Nigeria....such cruelty siphoning money meant for charity for your own uses😔
ReplyDeleteNonsense and ingredient!
ReplyDeleteEven if you must eat from it.. .at least let the social work you have done speak loudest. Some pple don't have sense. ..u did something like this in a correct system and you think you will never be nabbed?
Stella dem plenty for UK. The in-thing in the UK now is charity to help Africa,even pastors are into it. You see them travelling like birds to come build houses and businesses in Naija, all in the name of charity(because that's a perfect route for money laundering). UK police can be slow, but they will surely catch lots of them,bunch of thieves.
ReplyDeleteThe law works in some places. Setting up a foundation or charity to get free money to sustain your high life is a crime. Many of you celebs will face the music too.
ReplyDeleteOoh dear why??!! Why?!!
ReplyDeleteHow can one set up charity funds and eat from it.
Do you know the curse that awaits such a person.
It's a pirry.
Let them do the time.
Such laws should be applied in Nigeria.
Almost all our celebs are guilty of same act.
They all live large without baiting eyes.
It's not just celebs, what about that one who diverted 200 million meant for IDP?
ReplyDeleteI've always believed most NGO's around is just a means to enrich their founders, wicked lots. If they were really functioning a lot of sick and homeless people we see on the streets won't be out.
ReplyDeleteI know this family in warri!!! Sad
ReplyDeleteXxbarbiexx
Too bad for them..
ReplyDeleteWow!!! What a disgrace and shame they have brought upon their family!
ReplyDeleteSide eyes at all our "aturesses" setting up foundations here and there 😎😎😎👀👀👀
I hope this jail time, makes them truly reflect on their dubious ways and change.
ReplyDeleteThis 1 is ancestral curses..wey don pass generational curses.
ReplyDeleteChai! Their village matter is too deep!!!
Tufiakwa for dis kain blind greed & do or die thing for money.
The biggest shame is that they r now convicted & jailed for small peanut money that a division 5 footballer or civil servant sef can earn in a day.
which job is ogbonna kanu, Laura's husband doing? I'm concerned please, I need to know, does he have a job at all?
ReplyDeleteNo he doesn't have a job and his wife Laura has a store that nobody goes to. I been there a couple of times. It always empty but she makes so much noise on Instagram
DeleteInstagram is too much fake it till you make it
Heheheheeeh amebo, Laura feeds him , are u happy now?
Deletewhat a big shame and disgraceful act!
ReplyDeleteI don't support this siphoning charity funds for personal use, but I think the penalty should be monetary and forms of community services. Jail only if they can't refund the money. Don't curse Naija celebs only o, yours truly president of the supposed most powerful nation on earth Mr. DJT also did this and very recently too. He's getting away with it of course. He's now attempted to close the "charity".
ReplyDeleteMost NGOs is just to enrich the owners.
ReplyDeleteWhat a disgrace
Guys uk is not the zoo.
ReplyDeleteUdonminit???
DeleteOle Brothers
ReplyDeleteToo bad...quite unfortunate for them.
ReplyDeleteWhat a pity. See the disgrace they are getting for siphoning money meant for the poor. When will our naija have system like this that works?
ReplyDeleteWhen they come home and build big mansions, and do house warming, the same people condemning them went, ate and even begged bros for money.
ReplyDeleteNa wao! Once met Efe Sodje in welling.
ReplyDeleteStella stop acting like bad things only happen in Nigeria. This NGO funds diversion is very common in the western world too. That's how you said stealing pant and eating poop is only heard of in Nigeria. So in your Germany, you haven't heard of people stealing/buying worn pant with body secretions to sniff and do whatever else. The ones that like people to shit on them nkọ? Who says the ones stealing pant in Nigeria are only doing it for rituals? That man that was eating shit and they lynched, could he not have been mentally deranged?
ReplyDeleteMajority of the people who comment here have never seen outside the shores of Nigeria so don’t bother yourself
Deletehmmmm, fraudulent charities, well you guys should have known better that U.K is quite different from Nigeria. And there accountability is their watch word
ReplyDeleteNice One
ReplyDeleteNice 1
ReplyDeleteGood
ReplyDelete