Mona Faiz Montage, also known as Hajia4Real, is a social media influencer and artist. She entered a guilty plea for romantic fraud in a US court, to which she has responded publicly.
A statement shared on her Instagram page on February 21, 2024, which was sighted by 1FamilyRadio, stated that in order to appear in the criminal case in the Southern District of New York, she willingly traveled from Heathrow to JFK in May 2023.
In a statement, her legal team said that her plea did not reflect who she is as a person or what she is going through right now. She thanked her family, friends, and legal counsel for their support during the ordeal.
In order to appear in the criminal case in the Southern District of New York, Ms. Montrage willingly boarded the airplane from Heathrow to JKF in May 2023.
She started the process of ending that chapter of her life at that point. She accepted responsibility today for the money that was received from illegal activity that came to an end in 2019 via her bank accounts. The plea made by Ms. Montrage does not characterize her as a person or reflect who she is now.
Hajia4Real enters a guilty plea
The Southern District of Justice United States Attorney [DoJ] reports that the socialite entered a guilty plea to collecting fraud proceeds from a romance scheme.
“Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced the guilty plea today of MONA FAIZ MONTRAGE for her role in laundering the proceeds of a series of romance scams,” according to a DoJ statement dated February 21, 2024.
Montrage awaits sentencing.
Montrage entered a plea to one count of conspiracy to get stolen property; under US law, the maximum sentence for this offense is five years in prison.
She also agreed to pay forfeiture of $2,164,758.41 and make restitution in the same amount.
At an unspecified later time, US District Judge Paul A. Crotty will sentence her; it is unclear if she will receive the maximum five-year sentence.
What the Southern District of New York Attorney stated:
Regarding the guilty plea, attorney Damian Williams stated: “Mona Faiz Montrage was caught abroad and now faces major penalties for her acts after she knowingly collected money taken from senior Americans through romantic scams.
In addition to cruelly betraying their confidence when they realized their online romantic connection was fiction, romance scams like the one Montrage fell victim to also damage their defenseless, elderly victims by thieving their money.
No matter where they are, this agency and its law enforcement partners are unrelenting in our efforts to apprehend scammers who prey on Americans. He emphasized
Source: 1FamilyRadio