Two men were accused Monday of running a secret police station in Manhattan on behalf of the Chinese government – arrests that were part of a sweeping federal crackdown on Beijing’s influence campaign in the US.
“Harry” Lu Jianwang, 61, and Chen Jinping, 59, were each charged in Brooklyn federal court with conspiring to act as agents of China’s government and obstruction of justice for opening the covert outpost in Manhattan’s Chinatown in early 2022.
Lu, of the Bronx, allegedly helped security officials from the authoritarian nation locate dissidents who were living in the US, according to a criminal complaint filed against the pair.
Chinese officials also requested he participate in demonstrations against the Falun Gong, a religious movement subject to crackdown across the globe by the Chinese Communist Party.
“This prosecution reveals the Chinese government’s flagrant violation of our nation’s sovereignty by establishing a secret police station in the middle of New York City,” US Attorney Breon Peace said in a statement.
“Such a police station has no place here in New York City—or any American community,” he added.
Lu and Chen, of Manhattan, were allegedly directed to do China’s bidding, “including helping locate a Chinese dissident living in the United States,” Pearce said.
The two also tried to obstruct the Justice Department’s investigation by deleting their communications with an official of the Chinese Ministry of Public Security after finding out about the FBI probe, federal prosecutors said.
Charges against the pair were unveiled at the same time as 44 other defendants were charged in two separate complaints in Brooklyn federal court for various crimes related to illegally acting on behalf of China in the US.
More than 30 of those charged Monday were members of a Chinese police task force called the 912 Special Working Group that operated as a “troll farm” out of a security building in Beijing, prosecutors said.
The members of the task force created a host of fake online accounts – then spread Chinese state propaganda in an attempt to overwhelm speech that was critical of Beijing.
“These cases demonstrate the lengths the PRC government will go to silence and harass U.S. persons who exercise their fundamental rights to speak out against PRC oppression, including by unlawfully exploiting a U.S.-based technology company,” Assistant Attorney General Olsen said in a statement after the complaint was unsealed.
A total of 10 other Chinese residents were hit with charges related to a scheme to silence dissidents on a telecommunications platform, according to the feds.
The suspects used the company’s systems to silence users who were communicating about issues sensitive to the Chinese government, including the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
Members of the conspiracy worked to end video chat meetings organized by dissidents in New York, according to prosecutors.
“In the U.S., freedom of speech is a cornerstone of our democracy, and the FBI will work tirelessly to defend everyone’s right to speak freely without fear of retribution from the CCP,” David Sundberg, the Assistant Director-in-Charge, of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, said.
All of the suspects except for Lu and Chen — who were busted at their homes Monday morning — are at large in China, authorities said.