A Chinese-born businessman that the United States and China say ran one of Southeast Asia’s largest scam compounds was extradited to China to face charges of money laundering and other crimes, three years after he was arrested in Thailand.
The businessman, She Zhijiang, arrived in the Chinese city of Nanjing from Thailand on Wednesday. He would be one of the highest ranking figures linked to the scam industry to face charges in China, which launched a mass crackdown this year to rescue people trafficked to work as scammers in Southeast Asia.
China and the United States are among several countries that have recently taken steps to combat an industry that is largely based in Southeast Asia and has stolen billions of dollars from victims around the world.
The U.S. Treasury Department says Americans have lost more than $16.6 billion to online scams, and the Justice Department on Wednesday announced a new federal task force to disrupt scam operators by seizing equipment and crypto assets.
The United States has imposed sanctions in recent months on several people linked to scam centers in Myanmar and Cambodia, including She Zhijiang. The U.S. authorities said in September that Mr. She was the largest shareholder of Yatai New City, a sprawling development in Shwe Kokko, a Myanmar town on the border with Thailand.
Mr. She helped to transform Shwe Kokko into a hub for internet fraud, casinos, drug trafficking and prostitution, the U.S. authorities said. Scam operators in Yatai New City tricked people from around to world into working for crime syndicates there as online scammers, they said.
In China, the authorities issued an arrest warrant for Mr. She in 2021 on charges that included money laundering and running an online gambling ring, the Royal Thai police said in a statement. He was arrested in Bangkok in 2022 at the request of the Chinese Embassy, the Thai police said.
A lawyer for Mr. She in Thailand, Sanya Eadjongdee, said that his client denied the accusations. Mr. She’s lawyers were not allowed to see him in Thailand in the two days before his extradition, he added, and Mr. She could face torture, enforced disappearance or execution in China.
Mr. She is a former Chinese national who received Cambodian citizenship in 2017, according to Mr. Sanya.
The final order to extradite Mr. She came on Monday from Thailand’s Court of Appeals. He had submitted a petition to the Constitutional Court arguing that the country’s Extradition Act was unconstitutional.
The court disagreed.
Francesca Regalado is a Times reporter covering breaking news.
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