{"id":10144,"date":"2024-05-03T14:33:40","date_gmt":"2024-05-03T14:33:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/?p=10144"},"modified":"2024-05-03T15:06:02","modified_gmt":"2024-05-03T15:06:02","slug":"3-are-convicted-of-harassing-family-on-behalf-of-chinas-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/?p=10144","title":{"rendered":"Antony Blinken met Xi Jinping, 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"

Interesting to note, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken<\/a>‘s\u00a0 meeting with President \u00a0Xi Jinping during his two-day visit, (June 18-9, 2023), is during the three-week trial, when and where three would be \u00a0convicted of harassing family on behalf of China\u2019s government.<\/p>\n

How innocent is Xu Jin \u4e2d\u56fd\u5b98\u5458\u5f90\u8fdb?<\/p>\n

NYT 2023.6.20<\/a> \u2193<\/p>\n

3 Are Convicted of Harassing Family on Behalf of China\u2019s Government<\/p>\n

The defendants, including a private detective who said he did not realize he was working for an intelligence operation, pursued people living in New Jersey.<\/p>\n

Three men were convicted in Brooklyn federal court on Tuesday of stalking a family in the New Jersey suburbs on behalf of the Chinese government.<\/p>\n

The defendants, Michael McMahon, 55, Zhu Yong, 66, and Zheng Congying, 27, were found guilty of stalking and a related conspiracy charge. Mr. Zhu and Mr. McMahon were also found guilty of acting as unregistered foreign agents, and Mr. Zhu was convicted on a second conspiracy charge.<\/p>\n

Speaking outside the courthouse on Tuesday, Mr. McMahon, a retired New York Police Department sergeant turned private investigator, maintained his innocence and vowed to continue fighting to clear his name.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had known that they were part of a foreign government looking to harass anybody, I would have said no, and I would have called the F.B.I.,\u201d he said<\/p>\n

The verdict capped a three-week trial during which prosecutors laid out a detailed case accusing the men of playing roles in Operation Fox Hunt, a decade-long effort that Chinese officials have said is aimed at repatriating fugitives. The Justice Department contends that the campaign is part of the Communist Party\u2019s push to control Chinese nationals around the world.<\/p>\n

The Brooklyn case was the first the Justice Department prosecuted to counter the Chinese operation, and it unfolded as tensions between the rival superpowers reached new heights, with disagreements over China\u2019s growing military footprint and other issues. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken<\/a> met with Xi Jinping, China\u2019s leader, in Beijing over the weekend.<\/p>\n

The Justice Department has made cases related to China a primary focus in recent years, and the office of the U.S. attorney in Brooklyn, Breon S. Peace, is especially attuned to what it calls \u201ctransnational repression\u201d by foreign governments. In a statement after the verdict, Mr. Peace said that Mr. McMahon and Mr. Zhu had acted \u201cat the direction of a hostile foreign state.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will remain steadfast in exposing and undermining efforts by the Chinese government to reach across our border and perpetrate transnational repression schemes targeting victims in the United States in violation of our laws,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Wang Wenbin, a spokesman for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, accused the Justice Department on Friday of \u201cslanders and smears\u201d related to the case, adding that transnational repression \u201cis an allegation that best matches the U.S.\u2019s own practices.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. McMahon, of Mahwah, N.J., could face up to 20 years in prison, according to the U.S. attorney\u2019s office. But Lawrence Lustberg, his lawyer, said last week that federal sentencing formulas are complicated, and that he believed the maximum for all four counts Mr. McMahon was charged with would be less than three years. (Mr. McMahon was acquitted on one count.) According to prosecutors, Mr. Zhu, of Queens, could face 25 years, and Mr. Zheng, of Brooklyn, could face 10.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Mr. Lustberg called the verdict \u201can injustice\u201d and added that the conviction on stalking \u201ccriminalizes the work of private investigators in every case.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. McMahon said that he had notified the local police while conducting surveillance on five separate occasions, and that he had hired other former N.Y.P.D. detectives to help him. Mr. Lustberg had argued at trial that those facts were proof that Mr. McMahon was unaware that the case was connected to the Chinese government.<\/p>\n

Renee Wong, a lawyer for Mr. Zheng, said that she considered the verdict good news since he was acquitted of the two top charges, and that her team was considering an appeal of the stalking charge.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were no connections between the people that Mr. Zheng knew and the people that Mr. McMahon and Mr. Zhu knew. The connection was simply lacking,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Kevin Tung, a lawyer for Mr. Zhu, said the decision could increase the risks for any citizen or business dealing with overseas counterparts.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe message sent to the public is very troubling,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Mr. Zhu and Mr. Zheng are Chinese citizens with U.S. green cards. Mr. Tung said that his client was a retiree who had come to the United States about 20 years ago and worked in construction and odd jobs. Mr. Zheng\u2019s lawyers said in court that he had worked in a bubble tea shop but had to quit to attend the trial, and was living with a sister.<\/p>\n

Zhu Yong, who spoke little English, communicated with the help of a translation company. Credit…Jefferson Siegel for The New York Times<\/p>\n

During the trial, Judge Pamela K. Chen \u6cd5\u5b98\u9648\u5f00\u7f8e warned everyone involved to focus on the specific allegations, not the international politics swirling around them. The jury began to deliberate on Thursday.<\/p>\n

The case centered on Xu Jin, a former Chinese government official who moved to the United States over a decade ago. Prosecutors said the three defendants were key to a plot engineered by Chinese government officials to stalk and harass Mr. Xu and his family and to force him to return to China, where he could have faced the death penalty on an embezzlement charge.<\/p>\n

The jury was shown voluminous records documenting communications starting in fall 2016, when Mr. Zhu contacted Mr. McMahon, who was working as a private investigator in New Jersey.<\/p>\n

The older man, who did not speak much English, enlisted a translation company in Flushing, Queens, to help him communicate. Mr. McMahon\u2019s understanding was that he was working for a private company seeking to recoup money, Mr. Lustberg said.<\/p>\n

Mr. McMahon carried out surveillance for five days spread over six months in 2016 and 2017, and unearthed records related to Mr. Xu\u2019s whereabouts and assets. He also met Mr. Zhu\u2019s associate Hu Ji, who turned out to be a police officer in the Public Security Bureau in Wuhan, China.<\/p>\n

A face-to-face encounter among the men, at a Panera Bread restaurant in New Jersey, in October 2016, was captured in a photo shown to the jury as evidence of their direct ties.
\nImage<\/p>\n

In the picture, Mr. McMahon is grinning and standing between the two others with his arm around Mr. Zhu. After the meeting, Mr. Hu, using the name Eric Yan, began contacting Mr. McMahon directly with instructions.<\/p>\n

Mr. Lustberg argued during the trial that there was no evidence showing that Mr. McMahon knew that his investigation was being directed by the Chinese government. Rather, the emails about it had referred to a \u201ccompany\u201d requesting the work.<\/p>\n

The target of his investigation, Mr. Xu, was once the head of Wuhan\u2019s Municipal Development and Reform Commission, according to reports in Chinese state media. Those reports said he was wanted for embezzlement, abuse of power and accepting bribes. Mr. Xu testified at the Brooklyn trial but could not immediately be reached for comment after the verdict.<\/p>\n

The days for which Mr. McMahon was hired coincided with a 2017 trip to New Jersey by Mr. Xu\u2019s ailing 82-year-old father that prosecutors said Chinese officials had forced him to make.
\nImage<\/p>\n

The elder Mr. Xu\u2019s daughter had already been jailed because of his son\u2019s refusal to return home, jurors were told. Chinese officials then plotted to send the elder Mr. Xu to New Jersey to persuade his son to come back to China, prosecutors said. The officials did not know the younger Mr. Xu\u2019s address, and used his father as bait to lure him out and follow him, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n

Mr. Xu\u2019s sister-in-law testified about her shock when the older man showed up on her doorstep in Short Hills, N.J., with no warning. She had already received several threats related to Mr. Xu and knew that the Chinese government was trying to find him, she said. To thwart them, she arranged a meeting the next day at a nearby mall, rather than at Mr. Xu\u2019s home.<\/p>\n

Karen Zraick is a breaking news and general assignment reporter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interesting to note, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken‘s\u00a0 meeting with President \u00a0Xi Jinping during his two-day visit, (June 18-9, 2023), is during the three-week…<\/p>\n

Continue readingAntony Blinken met Xi Jinping, 2023<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"bgseo_title":"","bgseo_description":"","bgseo_robots_index":"","bgseo_robots_follow":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10144"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10144\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10155,"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10144\/revisions\/10155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ireneeng.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}