A Brooklyn woman and a Queens man on Thursday were charged with crimes for stealing more than $40 million in a pig butchering fraud scheme.
Zhuoying Chen, 27, also known as “Jolene" from Brooklyn, and Haojie Zhang, 38, also known as “Kevin” from Queens, were both arrested and charged with money laundering conspiracy derived from cyber investment fraud scams, according to Joseph Nocella Jr., United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
Between 2020 and 2022, Chen and Zhang allegedly managed a network of more than a dozen individuals based in Queens and Brooklyn, who opened bank accounts in the name of shell companies to launder proceeds of investment scams known as “pig butchering” fraud schemes, a term derived from a foreign-language phrase used by perpetrators to describe the crimes, according to Nocella.
These schemes consist of perpetrators contacting victims via messaging services or social media apps. The perpetrators then initiate relationships with the victims and gain their trust, convincing victims to send money for lucrative investment opportunities. The perpetrators also show the victims fake profits on the purported investment and encourage the victims to invest more. Ultimately, the perpetrators steal the victims’ funds.
Chen, Zhang and other co-conspirators in China oversaw the use of approximately 45 shell companies and 140 company bank accounts to allegedly launder at least $43 million in criminal proceeds from these schemes, prosecutors said.
“As alleged, the defendants were key members of a sophisticated money laundering network that funneled over $40 million in victim funds to bank accounts in
China, Nocella said in a statement. “Our Office will continue in its strong tradition of holding accountable anyone who seeks to prey on vulnerable victims with
investment fraud schemes.”
