According to LA Times on April 27, the U.S. Department of Justice and the mynewsLA website A Chinese woman in Los Angeles, California, pleaded guilty in a federal court in Los Angeles on Friday (26th) and was charged with using fake postage to mail tens of millions of packages and pleaded guilty to defrauding the United States Postal Service (USPS) of more than $150 million. Her husband has now fled back to China.
图源：LA Times、mynewsla
Lijuan "Angela" Chen, a 51-year-old resident of Walnut City, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the United States and use counterfeit postage, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. Chen was arrested on May 23, 2023, and subsequently charged with two counts: conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government, and using and possessing counterfeit postage.
Her co-defendant, Chuanhua "Hugh" Hu, a 51-year-old man, has fled to China. He was charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States, passing on and possessing forged U.S. debts, and counterfeiting stamps.
According to a statement from the Ministry of Justice, from January 2020 to May 2023, Chen Lijuan and Hu Chuanhua mailed more than 34 million packages containing counterfeit postage labels.
Under Chen's plea agreement, she and Hu Chuanhua own and operate a package shipping company based in Industrial City, which provides transportation and mailing services to logistics companies in China through USPS. Mr. Hu then began printing duplicate and forged NetStamps stamps to reduce postage costs, authorities said.
Source: U.S. Department of Justice
According to a previous report by the Ministry of Justice, Chen Lijuan's transportation and mailing business was previously run by her husband, Hu Chuanhua. In 2019, Hu Chuanhua fled to China two days after being questioned by postal inspectors. In November 2019, Hu Chuanhua became aware that federal authorities were investigating him, so he fled to China and continued to make fake postage to avoid detection, officials said. Federal authorities believe he used a computer program to forge shipping labels.
Meanwhile, Ms. Chen remains in Los Angeles, managing the warehouse that the two use to deliver packages for their business. In 2020, the couple began using fake postage to ship items through USPS. Authorities said they received packages from Chinese companies and shipped them through USPS using fake postage.
Source: Counterfeit postage (Source: Prosecution)
According to multiple inspections by the post office and the IRS, most of the mailing orders made by Chen Lijuan's company are fake, and the information in the barcode does not match the information on the mailing list. "USPS and USPIS staff conducted multiple inspections and found that the vast majority of the postage used by Chen and her company to deliver goods within the United States was fake," prosecutors wrote. "USPIS refers to the United States Postal Inspectorate, the federal law enforcement, crime prevention, and security arm of the U.S. Postal Service.
According to court documents, red flags raised by fake postage include the reuse of "smart barcode data" that has already been applied to other mailed packages. This data is used to prove that the label was paid for before it was shipped. Federal prosecutors said the company received packages from vendors and others, affixed shipping labels showing allegedly postage paid, and then arranged for the packages to be transferred to USPS facilities for shipment across the United States.
Authorities said that multiple packages sent by Mr. Hu and Ms. Chen contained fake Priority Mail postage.
Source: Counterfeit postage (Source: Prosecution)
According to Chen's plea agreement, the funds in her bank account, insurance policies, and properties in the Chinese ghetto of Chino, Chino Hill, Diamond Bar, South Al Monte, Walnut City, and West Covina will be confiscated. She will be sentenced in August and faces up to five years in prison for each count.
"This defendant was involved in a fraudulent scheme that caused enormous damage to the nation's postal service, and we remain committed to holding the fraudsters accountable and bringing justice to victims everywhere," U.S. federal prosecutor Martin Estrada said in a statement. ”