The chief financial officer (CFO) of The Epoch Times has been put before a judge on money laundering and fraud charges after being arrested on 2 June
Wiedong ‘Bill’ Guan, 61, CFO of international newspaper The Epoch Times, which has a UK edition, ‘participated in a sprawling, transnational scheme to launder at least approximately $67m (£52m) of illegally obtained funds,’ said the United States District Court Southern District of New York.
The defendant, who lives in New Jersey and works out of offices in Manhattan, was in charge of the company’s Make Money Online (MMO) team, which would use cryptocurrency to buy ‘tens of millions of dollars in crime proceeds’ and was aware of what they were doing allegedly.
The crime proceeds were bought at a discounted rate and then transferred to company bank accounts. Once here the funds were moved through other departments of the company through ‘tens of thousands of layered transactions.’ Additionally, some of the funds were transferred to Guan’s personal accounts.
As a result, the company’s revenue grew 410% in a single year, from $15m to $62m. Guan said the profit was from the work of one of the media company’s overseas offices, and also from a surge of paid subscriptions to the service. He also stated there was an influx of donations by supporters when the banks asked where the money was coming from.
The indictment alleges that the proceeds were transferred around the company’s accounts after staff working under Guan used stolen personal identification information to open pre-paid debit accounts, cryptocurrency accounts and bank accounts.
Between April 2020 and January 2021, there were 85 transfers from company accounts to one of Guans’, totalling $16.7m (£13m), which he then transferred $5.7m (£4.45) to cryptocurrency platforms and another personal account. He then proceeded to do the same again with $10.9m (£8.5m) without declaring any of the transfers on his tax filings for 2020 or 2021.
Although The Epoch Times was not mentioned in the indictment which was released on Monday, in a statement it said: ‘Although Mr Guan is innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, the company has suspended him until this matter is resolved,’ proceeding to say it will cooperate with the investigation against Guan.
The Epoch Times was founded in 2000 by Chinese-Americans in New York and handed out for free. It also runs a UK version of the website.