A Chinese worker pushes a baggage cart towards at Beijing's international airport (2013). On Tuesday, the ex-CEO of a international freight company pleaded guilty to allegedly conspiring to illegally export U.S. goods to federally prohibited Chinese companies that may of gotten to North Korea, the U.S. Justice Department said. File Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI |
License Photo
Nov. 26 (UPI) -- The ex-CEO of a international freight company pleaded guilty to allegedly conspiring to illegally export U.S. goods to federally prohibited Chinese companies that may of gotten to North Korea, the U.S. Justice Department said.
Richard Shih, 77, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to conspiring to violate export laws related to the Export Control Reform Act of 2018 by the alleged shipment of goods to Chinese companies on the U.S. Department of Commerce Entity List, the Justice Department announced in a release.
It carries a maximum sentence of up to five years in a federal prison. He awaits sentencing by a federal judge.
The DOJ named Shih as the founder and former chief executive officer of an unnamed California-based international logistics and freight forwarding company with offices in Grapevine, Texas.
However, multiple public information sources linked Richard Shih as the president of Express Line Corp., a freight company in business nearly 40 years located in Inglewood, Calif., with an office in Grapevine and other locations around the world.
According to court documents, Shih and Express Line had a pre-existing business relationship with the Chinese freight forwarder Seajet Company Limited.
Seajet had been placed on the Entity List in September 2018 for "unlawfully procuring and diverting" items of American origin to the communist-run North Korea.
It was alleged Seajet took part in activity "contrary to the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States," according to the Justice Department. It later included to the Entity List the addition of Seajet's Chinese transliterate alias Hisiang Logistics Company Limited in June 2021.
Meanwhile, a specific license was required to export goods from the United States to Seajet and Hisiang, officials say.
According to the Justice Department, Shih and Express Line knew that Seajet was on the Entity List and that Hisiang was the established alias for Seajet. The department said federal officials "repeatedly" attempted to educate Shih and Express Line about the Entity List and its corresponding laws.
"[t]here is nothing else changed such as company address, structure and policy etc," read part of an email by Seajet to Shih in explaining the alias Hisiang, which then was forwarded by Shih to his own employees.
But nonetheless, Shih and others allegedly continued to export and transact items to Seajet and its affiliates supposedly from September 2018 to May 2022. In evidence was 34 international wire transfers to accounts held by Express Line.
DOJ contends that in that timespan Shih's company had allegedly conducted more than 1,000 shipments of items from the United States to Seajet and its alter-ego Hisiang. Company records revealed an account code assigned to Seajet for a shipment to Hisiang yet Express Line continued to do business regardless.
The company allegedly used funds to pay for various expenses on the transactions, such as air carriers and trucking companies all the while keeping part as profit.
The FBI and the federal Bureau of Industry and Security investigated the case.
And prosecuting the case was Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay Weimer for the Northern District of Texas and trial attorney David J. Ryan of the National Security Division's Counterintelligence and Export Control Section.
