Calif. State Sen. Leland Yee
LOS ANGELES — A California senator was arrested Thursday on charges that included conspiracy to smuggle firearms from the Philippines into the United States.
Sen. Leland Yee (Democrat, San Francisco) and 25 others were named in a federal complaint charging them with firearms trafficking, money laundering, murder-for-hire, drug distribution, trafficking contraband cigarettes and honest services fraud.
The supplier of the weapons was a Filipino national “who previously sold guns to individuals from Florida and delivered through the Port of Cagayan de Oro,” according to the 137-page criminal complaint.
The complaint said Yee’s associate, 60-year-old Daly City resident Wilson Sy Lim, had access to Israeli assault weapons, which could be purchased through a captain in the Philippine military.
Lim’s contact had allegedly also been the source of firearms supplied to Muslim rebels in the Philippines.
“Lim’s associates in the Philippines were trying to overthrow the current government and needed money,” the complaint said.
“Senator Yee advised (that) the Philippines was a very corrupt country” and that the buyer of firearms “needed to be prepared to pay people at every level during the life cycle of the deal,” it said.
Yee talked about a trip he took to the Philippines where he had “armed guards with machine guns,” according to the complaint.
Yee also told the undercover agent that “the Philippine government was secretly funding some of the Muslim rebel groups in an effort to create a distraction so the people would not focus on all the corruption within the Philippine government.”
The agent told Yee he wanted up to $2.5 million worth of weapons for shipment to Newark, New Jersey, in transit to North Africa or Sicily, the complaint said.
The undercover agent had made a $5,000 contribution to Yee’s campaign for secretary of state in exchange for access to the firearms dealer, according to the complaint.
Yee, Lim and the other defendants are facing conspiracy charges for their alleged roles in the gun-trafficking scheme.
Yee was arrested on Thursday in a series of raids in the Bay Area and Sacramento targeting an alleged corruption conspiracy involving arms trafficking and campaign fraud to fund his candidacy for secretary of state.
He was released on $500,000 bail on the same day. His lawyer said the senator plans to plead not guilty to corruption and gun charges.
Also arrested in the raid was 54-year-old Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow, a former Chinatown gangster who now heads the Chee Kung Tong masonic organization in San Francisco.
The charges against Yee include conspiracy to deal firearms without a license, conspiracy to illegally transport firearms, six counts of a scheme to defraud citizens on his services, and wire fraud.
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