LAWFUEL – The US Legal Newswire – MICHAEL J. GARCIA, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that SUI MIN MA,
a/k/a “Frank Ma,” the leader of a Chinese organized crime group,
and BING YI CHEN, a/k/a “Ah Ngai,” were both convicted in
Manhattan federal court of murdering two individuals in Toronto,
Canada on July 20, 1994 in connection with their heroin
trafficking activities. MA pleaded guilty to the charges on
September 20, 2007, four days before the trial was set to begin.
Today, CHEN was found guilty by a jury of two counts of murder.
According to the Indictment, the evidence at trial, and
statements made during MA’s guilty plea:
MA was the “dai lo,” or leader, of a criminal
enterprise — alleged as the “Frank Ma Organization” — that was
engaged throughout most of the 1990s in heroin trafficking, the
export of stolen vehicles to China, the robbery of computer chip
manufacturers, illegal gambling, and alien smuggling. The Frank
Ma Organization committed five murders and one attempted murder
in furtherance of its criminal activities. Although the Frank Ma
Organization had connections in Hong Kong and China, it operated
principally in New York and California.
From 1991 through 1996, MA, CHEN, and their associates
were engaged in the importation of large, wholesale quantities of
heroin worth millions of dollars from Asia into the United States
for distribution in New York City and other locations. Around
the summer of 1994, MA’s principal heroin supplier in Hong Kong
called MA and asked him to kill his drug partner in Toronto,
Canada. MA agreed to arrange the murder as a favor for the
supplier and to strengthen their lucrative criminal partnership.
As a result, MA summoned several of his followers from Southern
California to New York City, briefed them on their mission,
provided them with a photograph of and addresses for the intended
victim, and then dispatched the hit team to Toronto to carry out
the killing.
MA gave CHEN the task of preparing the hit team for the
murders. CHEN, a lieutenant in the criminal organization and one
of MA’s longest-serving followers, traveled to Canada with the
leader of the hit team to scout out where the intended victim
lived and worked; went with the leader of the hit team to obtain
guns for the murder; attempted to smuggle those guns across the
Canadian border; and picked up members of the hit team from the
airport, giving each of them $2000 for their trip.
On July 20, 1994, two members of MA’s hit team shot
their way into a business office where the intended victim was
supposed to be, and killed KWAN KIN MING and YIP PAK YIN, two
office workers. Neither MING nor YIN were the intended victim or
were involved in narcotics trafficking.
MA and CHEN both face a maximum term of imprisonment of
life and a mandatory minimum of 20 years’ imprisonment on each of
the two murder charges. Sentencing is presently scheduled for
January 2008.
The convictions of MA and CHEN were the result of ten
years of investigative work into the MA organization, which has,
to date, resulted in 13 convictions.
Mr. GARCIA praised the efforts of the FBI’s Asian
Organized Crime Task Force, comprised of Special Agents of the
Federal Bureau of Investigation and Detectives of the New York
City Police Department, for their work on the investigation. Mr.
GARCIA also praised the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit,
a Toronto-based Asian Organized Crime Task Force, and the Toronto
Police Service, for the vital and ongoing assistance they have
provided in the investigation.
Assistant United States Attorneys W.S. WILSON
LEUNG, JONATHAN B. NEW, and MICHAEL M. ROSENSAFT are in
charge of the prosecution.
07-257 ###
