US journalist identifies three cases tied to 1990s drug network involving Tinubu — hints at possible fourth

American journalist and transparency activist Aaron Greenspan has identified at least three separate US legal cases connected to a drug-trafficking network investigated by American law enforcement in the 1990s — including proceedings involving President Bola Ahmed Tinubu — while raising the possibility of a fourth case that could be a sealed criminal indictment against the Nigerian president, though he stressed he has no conclusive evidence such an indictment exists.

According to Sahara Reporters, Greenspan made the disclosure in an exclusive interview with Laolu Akande, founder of Empowered Newswire, published on Wednesday, as part of his ongoing Freedom of Information Act lawsuit — Greenspan v. Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys et al., Case No. 1:23-cv-01816-BAH — seeking historical FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration records relating to Tinubu and Nigerian businessman Abiodun Agbele.

The three known cases Greenspan identified are a series of 1992 criminal indictments involving alleged members of the drug network — available at the US National Archives — a separate criminal case involving Agbele, and the 1993 civil forfeiture proceeding through which US authorities obtained approximately $460,000 held in an account bearing Tinubu’s name.

“There’s at least three known cases now that are tied to this drug ring,” Greenspan said. “There is the 1992 set of criminal indictments… there’s the unknown date indictment of Mr Agbele, and then there’s the civil forfeiture case, which involves Bola Tinubu.”

On the possible fourth case, Greenspan said the extraordinary level of investigative detail in the records he had reviewed — covering bank accounts, Tinubu’s wife, his mother and even a Nissan vehicle’s identification number — made the absence of a prosecution deeply puzzling.

“It is very detailed. Yet, at the end of all this excruciating detail, nothing happens,” he said, adding that this either meant investigators chose not to prosecute after years of investigation or that a criminal case was filed but remains sealed from public records.

“There could be a criminal indictment of Bola Tinubu as well, and that’s what we’re trying to find,” Greenspan said. “I don’t have any evidence that such a deal had been made, to be very clear. That remains an open question right now.”

Greenspan described Tinubu’s alleged role as financial rather than operational, citing DEA Special Agent Vincent Balbo’s testimony in a separate criminal proceeding. “Bola Tinubu comes into this because he was not distributing heroin directly. He was accused of laundering money for the proceeds from the heroin distribution,” he said.

The FOIA lawsuit is a civil dispute over access to government records and does not constitute a criminal prosecution of Tinubu. Tinubu has consistently denied any wrongdoing related to drug trafficking allegations.