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Keep up with the latest tech news, reviews and previews by subscribing to the Good Gear Guide newsletter. Show Comments. Security Watch. Best NBN Plans. Best Mobile Plans. During quiet moments, after he has finished lecturing for the day, Dr John Stone has flashbacks.
The way people beg for mercy when they die. Begging him. Begging God. A curse will be upon your life. Dr Stone teaches political science at the University of Benin, in southern Nigeria. But for decades he was a senior member of Black Axe — a Nigerian mafia-style gang tied to human trafficking, internet fraud and murder. They are also infamous for extreme violence. Images of those who cross their path — dead bodies mutilated or showing signs of torture — regularly surface on Nigerian social media.
At one point during our interview, recalling the most efficient means of killing, he leaned forward, squeezed his fingers into the shape of a gun and pushed them to the forehead of our producer.
The horror of these years has scarred him. Today, Dr Stone is remorseful for his past and a vocal critic of the gang he once served.
He is one of a dozen Black Axe sources who have decided to break their oaths of silence and reveal their secrets to the BBC, speaking to international media for the first time. The findings suggest that over the past decade, Black Axe has become one of the most far-reaching and dangerous organised crime groups in the world. You may even have an email from them in your inbox. Our investigation began with a death threat — a spidery, hand-written letter, delivered to a BBC journalist in Weeks earlier, the journalist had been digging into the illegal opioid trade in Nigeria and had met a number of Black Axe members face to face.
Someone had been tracking him and had found his home. Our search for answers led us to a man who claimed he had hacked tens of thousands of secret Black Axe documents — a huge cache of private communications, from hundreds of suspected members.
The messages, which span to , include communications about murder and drug smuggling. Emails detail elaborate and lucrative internet fraud. Messages plan global expansion. It was a mosaic of Black Axe criminal activity spanning four continents. The source of the hack claims Black Axe are desperate to kill him. He would not reveal his real name, instead he used a pseudonym — Uche Tobias.
We were able to verify key sections of the data — confirming that individuals mentioned, and a number of the crimes committed in the documents, did take place. Much of the hacked material is too horrifying to publish.
Axemen use secret forums — password-protected websites — to share photos of recent murders in internal chat groups. There are four gashes on his head. His white T-shirt is surrounded by a pool of his own blood. The imprint of a boot, stained red, marks his back.
Messages the BBC have translated from West African Pidgin show Axemen keeping track of how many rivals they have murdered, tallying up the figures like a football score in each region. But internet fraud, not murder, is the primary source of revenue for the gang.
The documents given to the BBC include receipts, bank transfers and thousands of emails showing Black Axe members collaborating on online scams around the world.
These scams are not small-scale, conducted by a lone wolf on a laptop. They are collaborative, organised and extremely lucrative operations, sometimes involving dozens of individuals working together across continents.
Among the leaked emails, the BBC uncovered a case of a man in California who was targeted by a network of suspected Axemen in , scamming him from Italy and Nigeria. The Bank in Switzerland seems to be fraudulent. Nobody knows how many similar Black Axe schemes are out there. The leaked documents show members communicating between Nigeria, the UK, Malaysia, the Gulf States, and a dozen other countries.
According to the Organised Crime Index, based on analysis from experts in Africa, Nigeria has the highest levels of organised crime on the continent — and these networks are expanding abroad. In Italy, decades-old mafia laws are being revived to tackle the expansion of Black Axe, who are said to be overwhelming local crime networks.
In April , 30 suspected members were arrested in the country, charged with human trafficking, prostitution and internet fraud. The US has taken a more aggressive approach. FBI operations against Black Axe were launched in November and September , eventually charging more than 35 individuals with multi-million dollar internet fraud. The group was founded 40 years ago in Benin City, Edo State. Black Axe are reported to play a pivotal role trafficking those who travel illegally, moving them between their bases in Benin City, North Africa and Southern Italy.
He says he was led away from campus, thinking he was attending an exclusive party. He writes how he was taken to a forest, where a group of men were waiting for him.
They stripped him and forced him to lie face down in the mud. Then they took turns whipping his skin raw with bamboo, beating him close to unconsciousness.
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