A Ghanaian woman has been sentenced to nearly six years in prison in the United States for laundering money from a nationwide romance scam that defrauded victims of millions of dollars.
43-year-old Nana Takyiwa Adonu, who lived in Odenton, Maryland, was sentenced by a US District Court in the Southern District of Iowa on July 22, 2026.
According to court documents, Adonu played a major role in an extensive romance scam in which fraudsters created fake profiles on dating sites and social media to swindle victims.
She ran a company called “Han-Dak LLC,” which was used to collect payments from victims. She received more than $1.6 million in total, including over $55,000 from a single victim in Iowa.
Investigators say victims sent the money believing it would help reunite them with people they had met online and believed to be romantic partners.
“Many victims drained their retirement accounts, sold their homes and vehicles, returned to work after retirement, and borrowed substantial sums from friends and family,” prosecutors said.
When the FBI questioned her, Adonu claimed Han-Dak LLC was a legitimate garment-production business operating in China. She later submitted false invoices and fabricated customer and vendor lists to a federal grand jury in an attempt to derail the investigation, according to court filings.
In addition to the prison term, she was ordered to pay $1,655,640.76 in restitution and will serve three years of supervised release upon completing her sentence.
Her co-defendant, Naabanyin Aniagyei-Cobbold, was sentenced in March 2026 to nine years in prison over the same scheme, along with an order to pay $1,554,442.46 in restitution.
FBI Omaha Special Agent in Charge Eugene Kowel, in a statement, said romance scammers exploit victims when they are most vulnerable, preying on people by convincing them a relationship is real and then abusing that trust to steal their savings.
The case was investigated by the FBI’s Omaha Cyber Task Force and the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, and prosecuted by Assistant US Attorney Joseph Lubben.
The FBI reports that about 59,000 Americans fell victim to romance scams in 2024 alone, losing over $672 million.
