By Tom Allard, Panarat Thepgumpanat and Panu Wongcha-um
BANGKOK (Reuters) – A second senior leader of a major drug syndicate has been arrested, a Thai narcotics officer has said, while a transnational drag network is stepping up the Sam Gor group, which police say is the drug trade in Asia-Pacific dominate.
The arrest of Lee Chung Chak, a Hong Kong citizen in October in October, preceded the sensational arrest in the Netherlands last year of Tse Chi Lop, a Canadian citizen in China who, according to police, is also the syndicate’s biggest leader as ‘The Company’. .
Lee, 65, is a former prison partner of Tse who is suspected of being involved in drug trafficking for four decades. In a 2018 Australian Federal Police (AFP) document reviewed by Reuters, setting out the top 19 targets in the syndicate, Lee is described as a “senior project manager responsible for large companies of border-controlled drugs” “.
The two arrests on different continents within three months stem from a decade-long investigation by the AFP, which also leads to the multinational operation Kungur task force targeting the syndicate.
Suspected senior drug traffickers in the Asia-Pacific region are rarely arrested and successfully prosecuted.
“The suspect was arrested by Thai Narcotics police on October 1 on the basis of an arrest warrant issued by a Thai court following an extradition request by the Australian government,” said Lieutenant General Montri Yimyaem. , head of Thailand’s narcotics suppression bureau, told Reuters when asked about Lee.
“The extradition is currently being processed by the court.”
According to recent investigators, Lee has emerged over the past few years as a competitor to the Canadians as a major player in the drug trade in the region, with Reuters on condition that they are not identified.
“We understand that his star was an equal or even bigger player,” said one of the investigators. “He is a very important arrest in his own right.”
Thai authorities seized a laptop and several telephones as they searched Lee’s apartment in a luxurious Bangkok area, a possible treasure trove of intelligence, the two investigators told Reuters. A third official added that a document and cash were also seized in several denominations.
Lee appealed the November approval by the Australian Criminal Court of Australia’s extradition request, a source at the Thai Ministry of Justice said. Tse is in prison in the Netherlands, where a court has yet to rule on his extradition to Australia.
Lee could not be contacted in jail, nor could Reuters identify his lawyer. An attorney from Tse declined to comment. An AFP media official declined to comment.
The alleged role of Tse – nicknamed Sam Gor, or ‘brother number three’ in Cantonese – as leader of the syndicate and the investigation into his activities was revealed by Reuters in 2019.
(A link to the Reuters special report: https://reut.rs/3oOjiIc)
The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has estimated that the syndicate will make up to $ 17 billion in methamphetamine trafficking in the Asia-Pacific region in 2018 alone. UNODC Representative for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, Jeremy Douglas, compares Tse to the infamous Latin American cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.
Police also suspect that the crime group is disclosing heroin, ketamine, cocaine and MDMA, ecstasy, several officials in the region told Reuters.
DRUG VETERAN
The AFP has requested that Tse and Lee arrest law enforcement agencies around the world. They are expected to be charged a decade ago for importing illicit drugs, investigators say.
The two men were delivering drugs to a drug ring in Melbourne and were recorded on clips led by ring leader Suky Lieu.
A ruling by a judge rejecting Lieu’s attempt to reduce his prison sentence said Lieu owned a small Asian grocery store and was in regular contact with his drug suppliers in Hong Kong. He uses as many as 60 phones and SIM cards and speaks in code. According to the verdict, Lieu is the leader of the drug ring. Tse and Lee were not mentioned in the verdict.
The two investigators told Reuters that Lee was arrested in Sydney in the 1980s, allegedly for being a driver of heroin couriers. He never went on trial because a key witness died, they said. Reuters could not independently confirm this.
Lee was sentenced in 1998 to 140 months in prison for playing a “supervisory role” in a conspiracy to import heroin into the United States, according to federal court evidence. Lee – who was extradited from Thailand to face the charge – spent time in Elkton Prison in Ohio while Tse was detained there.
Tse was sentenced to nine years in prison for a separate conspiracy to import heroin into the United States. The US Bureau of Prisons shows that the two were released within a month of completing their sentences.
Police suspect Lee later played a key role for the syndicate that oversees drug lab operators in the state of Shan in northern Myanmar and traveled there regularly, the two investigators said. Shan State, largely controlled by ethnic armed groups, has been the center of drug production in the Golden Triangle of Southeast Asia for decades.
(Reporting by Tom Allard, Panarat Thepgumpanat and Panu Wongcha-um in Bangkok; additional reporting by Stephanie van den Berg in The Hague; editing by William Mallard)