PHOENIX, Ariz. — A Jamaican man accused of running a romance scam that defrauded an 85-year-old Arizona woman out of $400,000 has been extradited to the United States to face federal charges, authorities announced Wednesday.
Sherwayne Benjamin Bellinfantie, also known as “Ice Man,” was arrested in Jamaica in July 2023 and extradited to Arizona last week. He is scheduled for arraignment and a detention hearing Monday morning in Tucson.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona, Bellinfantie and unnamed co-conspirators operated a romance and sweepstakes scam between December 2015 and January 2019, targeting a woman from Vail, a community southeast of Tucson in Pima County.
In March 2022, a federal grand jury indicted Bellinfantie on charges of:
Conspiracy to commit wire fraud
Conspiracy to commit money laundering
Each charge carries a potential penalty of up to 20 years in federal prison if convicted.
Federal prosecutors say Bellinfantie and his team used deception and emotional manipulation to gain the victim’s trust, convincing her to transfer hundreds of thousands of dollars under false pretenses.
Arizona remains a hotspot for online romance scams. In 2022 and 2023, residents reported losses totaling $47 million to such schemes, one of the highest rates in the country.
