SAN FRANCISCO — Federal authorities announced the indictment Friday of state Sen. Leland Yee, Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow and 27 other defendants targeted in a wide-ranging FBI investigation into drug and weapons trafficking, money laundering, public corruption and murder for hire.
The grand jury indictment adds an eighth felony charge to the case against Yee, building on the allegations laid out last week in a stunning 137-page FBI affidavit that reverbrated throughout California and made national headlines. Yee faces six counts of honest services fraud, or bribery, one count of conspiracy to commit honest services fraud and one count of conspiracy to traffic weapons.
The 65-year-old Democratic lawmaker was arrested Wednesday in a major FBI sweep on the basis of the affidavit. The indictment, filed Thursday in San Francisco federal court and released Friday morning, contains the formal charges against the 29 defendants in the alleged criminal conspiracy.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office declined to comment on the indictment, which names three people who were not included in the affidavit: Tong Zao Zhang, Zhanghao Wu, and Barry Blackwell House. House, aka “Barry Black,” is charged with weapons trafficking. Zhang and Wu are charged with dealing stolen cigarettes.
Yee’s new attorney, former federal prosecutor Jim Lassart, ddeclined to comment Friday. Lassart on Wednesday replaced Paul DeMeester, who suggested after a court hearing Monday in San Francisco that Yee may have been entrapped or unfairly targeted by the FBI.
Yee, who is free on $500,000 bail, has not made any public comments since his arrest. He is scheduled to return to court Tuesday.
Yee’s purported involvement in the case began in May 2011 when his fundraiser, Keith Jackson, allegedly began soliciting an undercover agent for donations to Yee’s campaign that year for San Francisco mayor. Yee lost the election, but he and Jackson continued to seek illegal donations to pay off debt from the mayoral campaign and fuel his 2014 run for California secretary of state, according to investigators.
The state Senate voted March 28 to suspend with pay Yee and two Democratic colleagues who were recently indicted on separate charges. Yee, who represents part of San Francisco and most of San Mateo County, has withdrawn his secretary of state candidacy.
Jackson and Yee took $62,600 in cash and checks from undercover agents posing as criminals and corrupt businessmen between 2011 and 2014, according to the indictment. A third of the money was tied to Well Tech, a fake software consulting company that Yee allegedly promoted for a contract with the California Department of Public Health.
On Oct. 18, 2012, for instance, Yee recommended Well Tech during a conference call with an undercover agent posing as a health department official. In January 2013 Yee’s office sent a letter to Well Tech expressing the senator’s support for the company’s expansion into California.
The senator also took illegal donations, the indictment charges, in exchange for issuing a 2013 proclamation honoring Ghee Kung Tong — a San Francisco-based organization headed by alleged gang member Chow — and for lobbying two fellow senators on behalf of medical marijuana legislation.
The FBI alleges that Ghee Kung Tong and another group associated with Chow, Hop Sing Tung, are both longstanding civic organizations that also engage in a wide range of criminal activity. Yee delivered a speech Feb. 28 at an annual Hop Sing Tung dinner in Chinatown, according to the affadavit.
Yee, a proponent of tougher gun laws, is also charged with conspiring to arrange an illegal arms deal between an undercover FBI agent and Wilson Lim, a Daly City dentist and longtime political supporter of Yee. On March 14, just 12 days before their arrest, Yee and Keith Jackson met with an undercover officer and took a payment of $6,800 along with a list of weapons to pass to Lim, according to the indictment.
Jackson, a political consultant and former member of the San Francisco board of education, faces an array of charges, including drug and weapons trafficking. The most shocking allegation is that Jackson, his son Brandon, and an associate named Marlon Sullivan conspired to kill a man for $25,000.
Jackson was released from an Oakland detention facility Thursday evening on $250,000 bail.
Contact Aaron Kinney at 650-348-4357 or akinney@bayareanewsgroup.com. Follow him at Twitter.com/kinneytimes.
