A San Gabriel Valley girl who was accused of utilizing counterfeit postage on tens of hundreds of thousands of packages pleaded responsible Friday to defrauding the US Postal Service out of greater than $150 million.
Lijuan “Angela” Chen, 51, pleaded responsible to 1 rely of conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and one rely of utilizing counterfeit postage, in keeping with a press release from the U.S. Justice Division.
Chen, a resident of Walnut, has been in federal custody since she was arrested in Might 2023. A co-defendant, 51-year-old Chuanhua “Hugh” Hu — who authorities say is taken into account a fugitive hiding in China — has been charged with one rely of conspiracy to defraud the U.S., three counts of passing and possessing counterfeit obligations of the U.S. and a rely of forging and counterfeiting postage stamps.
In all, authorities allege that the duo mailed greater than 34 million parcels containing counterfeit postage labels from January 2020 by way of final Might.
In accordance with Chen’s plea settlement, she and Hu owned and operated a Metropolis of Business-based package deal transport firm that supplied transport by U.S. Mail for China-based logistics companies.
Hu then started to print duplicate and counterfeit NetStamps in an effort to chop the price of postage, authorities allege.
In November 2019, officers say, Hu grew to become conscious that federal authorities had been investigating, so he fled to China, the place he continued to create counterfeit postage and keep away from detection. Federal authorities imagine he used a pc program to manufacture transport labels.
In the meantime, Chen remained within the San Gabriel Valley, managing the warehouses the 2 used to ship packages for his or her enterprise. The pair then started utilizing counterfeit postage to ship gadgets by U.S. Mail in 2020. Authorities say they might obtain packages from China-based firms and apply the faux postage to ship them by way of the Postal Service.
In accordance with court docket paperwork, the crimson flags raised by faux postage included the reuse of “clever barcode knowledge” already utilized to different mailed packages. These knowledge are used to show the labels have been paid for previous to transport.
A number of packages shipped by Chen and Hu included counterfeit Precedence Mail postage, authorities stated.
Underneath the phrases of Chen’s plea settlement, she’s going to forfeit funds in her financial institution accounts, insurance coverage insurance policies and actual property in Chino, Chino Hills, Diamond Bar, South El Monte, Walnut and West Covina. She is scheduled to be sentenced in August, and faces as much as 5 years in jail for every rely.
“This defendant participated in a fraud scheme that prompted huge losses to our nation’s postal service,” U.S. Atty. Martin Estrada stated in a press release. “My workplace will proceed to concentrate on holding fraudsters accountable and bringing justice to victims in every single place.”
