-Willy Okonji
The District Court in Atlanta, Georgia, has cleared Allen Onyema, the CEO of Air Peace, of all business fraud charges after a three-year investigation involving multiple U.S. agencies. Despite the intense legal proceedings, Onyema was found to have no case to answer in relation to the allegations of financial misconduct.
However, the court imposed a $4,000 fine and probation on Ebony Mayfield, a former administrative staff of Springfield Aviation Company Inc. She had limited involvement in the Letters of Credit transactions and pleaded guilty to one charge.
The court’s ruling came after Mayfield recognized the difficulty of explaining the transactions, used for the purchase of aircraft for Air Peace, in a jury trial.
A statement from Augustine Alegeh & Co., the law firm representing Air Peace, explained, “Mayfield was simply an administrative staff with limited knowledge of the transactions, and her guilty plea was more a recognition of the complexities involved.
“The firm emphasized that probation is the lightest sentence available under U.S. federal law, and there was no financial loss to any bank. “Our clients never took loans or credit from any American bank. Mayfield was never paid $20,000 to commit fraud, contrary to rumors circulating,” the statement said.
The firm also clarified that the transactions involved legitimate funds and that no bank or third party suffered any loss. “There was no victim, no loss of funds, and no criminal intent,” the statement reiterated.
The law firm concluded by asserting that Onyema’s innocence had been reviewed by various law enforcement agencies in Nigeria, further confirming the lack of any criminality. “Our clients remain resolute in their assertion of innocence.”
