Sam Cooper

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Striking a cell capable of washing $100 million within what U.S. counter-narcotics officials describe as a half-trillion-dollar global enterprise, federal prosecutors have secured convictions against three men tied to a China-based transnational laundering syndicate, exposing how Mexican cartel drug proceeds flowed quietly through Charlotte banks as overdose deaths surged across the Carolinas.

The case, centered in Charlotte, North Carolina, reveals the concealed infrastructure enabling Mexican cartels to convert fentanyl profits into clean capital, aided by sophisticated Chinese professional launderers operating like underwriters and rogue accountants—embedding illicit funds in regional banks using fake identities and a dense lattice of shell companies.

Prosecutors say Maoxuan Xia, 29, of China; Shao Neng Lin, 58, of Baldwin Park, California; and Zhou Yu, 42, of China, laundered more than $92 million in drug proceeds through this underground system. Court records show the trio used false documentation and coordinated deposits to move over $700,000 through Charlotte-area financial institutions alone.

Donald Im, a former top DEA illicit finance expert, said the system is designed so that all roads ultimately lead to Beijing’s treasury—with narcotics proceeds flowing back to China through laundering networks, while cartels handle the production and distribution of synthetic opioids sourced from Chinese factories.

The Charlotte case offers a rare, granular view into how that system functions on the ground. Xia served as a primary collector, retrieving cash from cartel-linked operatives across the United States. In less than two years, he laundered over $30 million. Lin and Yu operated back-end accounts, managing shell firms that each moved approximately $20 million. All three men entered guilty pleas this spring.

Investigators describe the laundering structure as part of a wider financial ecosystem anchored in Chinese underground banking hubs—active in cities such as Vancouver, Toronto, Mexico City, New York and Los Angeles. These operations pair U.S. drug money with Chinese nationals looking to move renminbi out of the mainland, exploiting capital flight demand to create an opaque, dollar-based network of cash flow. Funds are then reinvested in electronics exports, real estate, and layered wire transfers—largely beyond the reach of Western regulators.

The Charlotte convictions come amid a regional overdose emergency. In 2023, South Carolina reported 44.7 overdose deaths per 100,000 residents, far exceeding the U.S. average of 31.3. Georgia recorded 2,687 overdose deaths in 2022, a 300 percent increase since 2010. In North Carolina, more than 36,000 people have died from drug overdoses since 2000, with over 4,000 deaths recorded in 2021 alone. Fentanyl now accounts for nearly 80 percent of opioid fatalities in the Carolinas.

Taken together, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia form one of the most intensely affected overdose corridors in North America. Only British Columbia—where Vancouver’s urban fentanyl crisis remains in declared emergency—and West Virginia report comparably higher death rates. British Columbia recorded 48.5 overdose deaths per 100,000 residents in 2024; West Virginia reached 80.9 per 100,000 in 2022.

A parallel indictment in South Carolina, unsealed in April, further illustrates China’s financial blueprint. Prosecutors charged Nasir Ullah, 28, and Naim Ullah, 32, of Sumter, along with Puquan Huang, 49, of Buford, Georgia, with laundering millions in cartel-linked proceeds. According to court filings, the men concealed cash in Sumter-area properties before converting it into overseas electronics shipments to Hong Kong and Dubai. Investigators allege the group was linked to broader laundering cells stretching into Asia and the Middle East.

While no financial institutions were charged in the Charlotte case, the use of fraudulent documents and synthetic identities to move large sums underscores continuing vulnerabilities in U.S. bank compliance systems—particularly in regional markets where oversight mechanisms may lag behind the sophistication of illicit finance networks.

The case was prosecuted under Operation Take Back America, a multi-agency U.S. initiative focused on dismantling the financial backbone of transnational fentanyl trafficking. Officials involved say targeting launderers may yield more strategic disruption than intercepting drug shipments alone—striking directly at the revenue pipelines keeping the trade alive.

Im, who led transnational threat targeting units within DEA’s Special Operations Division, has long studied the convergence of criminal enterprise and state-sanctioned economic leverage. In his assessment, Chinese laundering brokers serve both cartel clients and parallel financial objectives of the state—helping the proceeds of Western fentanyl sales find their way into Belt and Road infrastructure loans, real estate portfolios, and capital-export schemes tied to China’s global influence-building.

Daniel Andrews, Premier of Victoria

From LifeSiteNews

By David James

Monica Smit said she is launching a private criminal prosecution against Daniel Andrews based on ‘new evidence proving they enforced lockdowns without medical advice or evidence.’

The fiercest opponent of the former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews during the COVID crisis was activist Monica Smit. The government responded to her advocacy by arresting her for participating in anti-lockdown protests. When she refused to sign her bail conditions she was made, in effect, a political prisoner for 22 days.  

Smit subsequently won a case against the Victoria Police for illegal imprisonment, setting an important precedent. But in a vicious legal maneuver, the judge ensured that Smit would be punished again. She awarded Smit $4,000 in damages which was less than the amount offered in pre-trial mediation. It meant that, despite her victory, Smit was liable for Victoria Police’s legal costs of $250,000. It was not a good day for Australian justice. 

There is a chance that the tables will be reversed. Smit has announced she is launching a private criminal prosecution against Andrews and his cabinet based on “new evidence proving they enforced lockdowns without medical advice or evidence.”

The revelation that the savage lockdown policies made little sense from a health perspective is hardly a surprise. Very little of what happened made medical sense. For one thing, according to the Worldometer, about four-fifths of the people who tested positive for COVID-19 had no symptoms. Yet for the first time in medical history healthy people were treated as sick.  

The culpability of the Victorian government is nevertheless progressively becoming clearer. It has emerged that the Andrews government did not seek medical advice for its curfew policies, the longest in the Western world. Andrews repeatedly lied when he said at press conferences that he was following heath advice. 

David Davis, leader of the right wing opposition Liberal Party, has made public a document recording an exchange between two senior health officials. It shows that the ban on people leaving their homes after dark was implemented without any formal input from health authorities. 

Davis acquired the email exchange, between Victorian chief health officer Brett Sutton and his deputy Finn Romanes, under a Freedom of Information request. It occurred two-and-a-half hours after the curfew was announced. 

Romanes explained he had been off work for two days and was not aware of any “key conversations and considerations” about the curfew and had not “seen any specific written assessment of the requirement” for one. 

He added: “The idea of a curfew has not arisen from public health advice in the first instance. In this way, the action of issuing a curfew is a mirror to the State of Disaster and is not occurring on public health advice but is a decision taken by Cabinet.” Sutton responded with: “Your assessment is correct as I understand it.” 

The scale of the deceptions is becoming harder for most Australians to avoid if they are paying attention. The mainstream media, for example, is now running stories that the virus originated in a laboratory. Those who have memories will recall that in 2020 anyone suggesting that the virus was artificially made were accused of anti-China racism, especially the state broadcasters SBS and the ABC. Likewise, most politicians and academics dismissed the lab leak theory. To say the least, no one is holding up their hand to take responsibility for their errors. 

The email exchange, compelling evidence of the malfeasance of the Andrews government, raises further questions. If Smit’s lawyers can get Andrews to respond under oath, one ought to be: “If you were lying about following medical advice, then why were you in such a hurry to impose such severe measures and attack dissenters?” 

It remains a puzzle. Why did otherwise inconsequential politicians suddenly turn into dictatorial monsters with no concern for what their constituents thought?  

The most likely explanation is that they were told it was a biowarfare attack and were terrified, ditching health advice and applying military protocols. The mechanism for this was documented in a speech by Queensland senator Malcolm Roberts.  

If so, was an egregious error of judgement. As the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed, 2020 and 2021 had the lowest level of respiratory diseases since records have been kept. There was never a pandemic. 

There needs to be an explanation to the Australian people of why they lost their liberty and basic rights. A private prosecution might achieve this. Smit writes: “Those responsible should face jail time, nothing less. The latest revelation of ‘document 34‘ is just the beginning. A public criminal trial will expose truths beyond our imagination.”