Chinese nationals illegally in US arrested in east Texas for money laundering

A rural east Texas district attorney has described how the border crisis is impacting her community after two Chinese nationals were arrested on money laundering charges.

Their arrest was not the first where “we have encountered Chinese nationals on the highway engaged in illegal activities. We had another large seizure about 11 months ago where we took a half a million dollars from two Chinese nationals,” Van Zandt County District Attorney Tonda Curry said in a news conference.

The recent arrests were the first involving gold bullion, she said. “Their story started with them leaving China and coming here to prey on Americans. It ends right now with us taking $250,000 worth of gold from their organization.”

Last Thursday, Wills Point Police Department Sgt. Charlie Hughes, a K-9 handler, was working traffic enforcement along I-20 when he pulled over two Chinese nationals in a White Chevy Malibu with Michigan plates committing a traffic violation.

Weijian Chen, 25, and Wenqiang Lin, 46, spoke no English and Hughes used a translation phone app to communicate. Lin, who rented the car, agreed to a search and Hughes’ decorated K-9 Hania found a bag full of gold bullion worth nearly $300,000 stuffed under the driver’s seat.

Both Chen and Lin said they didn’t know who the bag of gold belonged to. They were arrested. “Based on my training, I know that it is very unlikely that Lin or Chen could have transported the gold bullion through airport Transportation Security Administration security checkpoint with[out] filing a United States Currency Transaction Report,” Hughes said.

Their claims and suspicious activity fell flat, authorities said, like others arrested by Operation Lone Star officers, The Center Square first reported.

Hughes contacted Homeland Security and learned that the Chinese men illegally entered in California last September and December. Instead of detaining them or processing them for removal, Border Patrol agents released them, giving them notices to appear before an immigration judge.

Investigators found that Chen left China last September, and from Hong Kong flew to Turkey and then to Mexico. Once he arrived in Mexico, he traveled by foot to Tecate, California, where he illegally entered the U.S. with a large group of mostly military age Chinese men.

Last December, Chen also illegally entered in California, was apprehended by Border Patrol “and even though he was attempting to enter illegally was allowed to enter our current administration’s policies,” Curry said. He was also given an NTA, like Lin.

Both men are currently being held in Van Zandt County Jail.

They claimed to be “poor immigrants who have nothing,” Curry said, but “left Los Angeles on an airplane, flew to Atlanta, according to them for play, for vacation.”

After they arrived in Atlanta, they rented a car and were stopped by a Monroe County Sheriff’s Office Criminal Interdiction Unit for a traffic violation. The officer’s narcotics dog searched the vehicle and found nothing. The deputy then tracked their car and contacted the rental company. They both had registered driver’s licenses, from California and Hawaii.

They went back to the rental company, rented a different vehicle, and drove to Marietta, Georgia, “an area that according to the local law enforcement is known to be controlled by the cartel, by people who prey on U.S. citizens selling drugs,” Curry said.

They left Marietta, drove south to Jacksonville, Florida, where they stayed for roughly two hours, then headed north where they were intercepted on Interstate 20 heading to Dallas and “presumably back to LA where the car was due to be turned in,” she said. “Those are the type of people that are coming in at our southern border … who come here and help organizations that prey on U.S. citizens.”

Curry also questioned any claims the men may have made to Border Patrol agents, stating they appear to have illegally entered the U.S. to engage in organized crime potentially linked to cartels, gangs, drug trafficking and money laundering.

“When you come here and you're engaging in criminal activity in less than a year, you'll never convince me that you came with good intent,” she said.

Van Zandt County is one of 55 counties whose leaders have declared an invasion, The Center Square exclusively reported.

Under the Biden administration, the greatest number of Chinese nationals have illegally entered the U.S., nearly 160,000, including hundreds who’ve reportedly breached U.S. military bases, The Center Square reported.

Their arrest “really highlights and is a great example of the failure of the Biden-Harris administration's policies and our southern border. If you don't think that the chaos down at the border is not affecting rural East Texas, this arrest is a prime example of that,” state Rep. Jill Dutton, a Republican who represents the area, said. “The Biden-Harris administration’s failed border policies are harming Americans. If you think this problem is limited to just the border cities, think again.”