2024-04-24 03:13:00
A Happy Valley woman is accused of running a money laundering ring that hid nearly $100 million in drug proceeds for a drug trafficking organization.
Enhua Fang, 37, is the first of five defendants named in a six-count indictment filed in federal court in North Carolina, charged with conspiracy to launder money, conceal money laundering, engage in transactions involving derivative property involve and assist in those crimes.
Fang was arrested on April 18 in Oregon.
She appeared in federal court in Portland Tuesday followingnoon with Assistant Federal Public Defender Ryan Costello. U.S. Magistrate Judge Jolie A. Russo ordered Fang to remain in custody and transferred to North Carolina for prosecution following prosecutors urged her to remain in custody.
The indictment is sealed, but the government’s motion to keep Fang in jail lays out the allegations from a 2022 multi-agency investigation.
Although money laundering is not a charge that typically requires detention, the “scope, scope and volume” of Fang’s alleged crimes warrant her remaining in prison, according to Melanie L. Alsworth, acting assistant deputy chief of the U.S. Department of Justice ‘s Division of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs.
“The defendant was central to the organization’s money laundering mechanism,” Alsworth wrote in the motion.
Fang “hid in the shadows” as he “called the shots,” Alworth wrote in the motion.
Fang is accused of running one of the most active cells and was allegedly the first point of contact for Mexican drug trafficking groups, according to Alsworth.
She would coordinate with drug traffickers in the U.S. and send couriers to pick up hundreds of thousands of dollars in drug money and make bank deposits, Alsworth wrote.
Between May 2022 and January 2024, investigators traced 1,149 cash deposits completed by the couriers that exceeded $92 million, Alsworth wrote.
The couriers deposited money into accounts registered in the names of shell companies controlled by the illegal organization, the motion said. The money was then further laundered through cryptocurrency and other bank accounts, Alsworth wrote.
Fang, for example, was caught on a June 1, 2022, federal wiretap arranging to pick up money from a North Carolina drug dealer to pay a source of supply in Mexico, Alsworth wrote.
The drug dealer called and asked to “make an appointment” and she replied that she would text “the series,” according to the motion.
The merchant sent Fang a long code, which was the serial number to a dollar bill used for authentication purposes. Fang was told the deposit was “100” and sent an address for a meeting, the motion said.
Soon following, the merchant texted Fang a different deposit amount, “110,” and a different address, and a courier sent by Fang picked up $110,000 in cash, the motion said.
Cash pickups typically ranged from $100,000 to as much as $300,000, Alsworth wrote.
The operation used encrypted messages, fake driver’s licenses and various communication channels to avoid detection, according to the motion.
From May to September 2022, for example, the group’s couriers operating under Fang’s direction made at least 102 bulk cash deposits totaling regarding $17 million into the account of a shell company called Kowloon Holding Inc. made, according to the motion.
The deposits were made in banks in regarding 20 different states, including California, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin, according to Alsworth.
With Fang facing a lengthy prison term if convicted, she would have an incentive to flee to China, her home country, which does not have an extradition treaty with the United States, Alsworth wrote in the motion . Fang would also have access to high-quality, fake ID documents that the money launderer allegedly used, Alsworth argued.
While Fang did not use fake ID, she took other steps to try to hide her identity, the prosecutor wrote, including using multiple cell phones and changing SIM cards and phone numbers.
Investigators seized bank records, security materials from banks and conducted physical surveillance of the teller machines and cash deposits, the motion states.
Fang has lived in the United States since March 2021 and is classified as a lawful permanent resident. But her immediate family remains in China and “might provide an easy safe haven for her” should she decide to leave the country, prosecutors argued in court documents.
She spent regarding five weeks in China last fall, according to federal court documents. Within 15 months of her move to the United States, she was active in the alleged money laundering scheme, according to Alsworth. She lived in Oregon and New York and had no legal job, the prosecutor wrote to the court.
– Maxine Bernstein covers federal court and criminal law. Reach her at 503-221-8212, [email protected]follow her on X @maxoregonianor on LinkedIn.
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