Eight Jamaicans who are facing extradition to the United States were this afternoon remanded when they appeared in the Corporate Area Criminal Court.
The accused were arrested last week on suspicion of being major players in a multi-million dollar lottery scamming ring.
The cases are to be mentioned next week Wednesday when issues of disclosure are to be resolved.
The Jamaicans were arrested last week following an indictment issued by the North Dakota Grand Jury in July of 2015 in relation to a lottery scamming ring.
Allegations are that the lottery scamming ring was headed by a man known as Lavrick Willocks and has been operating since 2008.
All 8-who are facing extradition were among 19 persons taken into custody following a Police operation in St. James, Trelawny, Kingston and St. Andrew.
Prosecutors are alleging that the accused fleeced elderly victims of 5-point-6-million US dollars.
This by encouraging the victims to send fees and other taxes in order to collect other lottery winnings.
Over 80-persons were allegedly defrauded.
Prosecutors say the money was sent to middle men in the US then sent to Jamaica via bank transfers, cheques or currency transferred via luggage.
The accused are charged with wire and mail fraud.
Three of the accused – Dahlia Hunter, Kazra Grey and Alric McLeod are being represented by Queen’s Counsel Tom Tavares Finson.
Another of the accused – Kimberly Hudson, has hired KD Knight QC in a bid to prevent her being extradited to face US Prosecutors.
Attorney Bert Samuels stood in for Mr. Knight in Court today.
Mr. Samuels made an application for bail on behalf of Miss Hudson who is 8-months pregnant.
The bail application was denied on the basis that Hudson may be a flight risk and she’s able to receive adequate medical attention behind bars.
Hudson is facing 48 counts of wire fraud, 15 counts of mail fraud and one count of money laundering.
Xanu Morgan, Oniel Brown, Dario Palmer and Jason Jahalal are the other accused.
US Law enforcement sources have told our news center that the arrest of the 8 Jamaicans is connected to the case in which popular Jamaican disc jockey ZJ Wah Wah was recently convicted of scamming and wire fraud.
Wah Wah is incarcerated in the United States awaiting his prison sentence.
— 30 —