$200M Chinese Smuggling Ring Broken Up, 10 Arrested

Federal prosecutors have arrested and charged 10 individuals with smuggling $200 million in counterfeit goods into New York from China in what they say is one of the largest smuggling rings ever uncovered.

The ringleaders are accused of shipping 100 containers of counterfeit apparel, including Nike sneakers, designer jeans, and luxury-brand wallets and purses, for sale at stores in Brooklyn and Queens. Prosecutors say the suspects bribed agents posing as New Jersey port workers with $500,000 in cash and created fraudulent documents to pass through security. "For over a year, this international smuggling organization engaged in a scheme designed to evade our border security controls," U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia said yesterday morning. "It is always deeply troubling when a criminal enterprise seeks to circumvent our port security, whatever the form of contraband and wherever the port of entry."

Early Wednesday, immigration agents searched four sites linked with the smuggling ring, seizing $80,000 in cash and two of the trucks used to transport containers from the port in New Jersey to New York, prosecutors said. The investigation is ongoing.

The defendants could each face up to 35 years in prison and a maximum fine of $2.5 million.