3 More Chinese Researchers Charged With Smuggling Biological Materials Into US

Three additional Chinese researchers at the University of Michigan have been charged as part of an ongoing investigation into the smuggling of biological materials from China to the United States, the U.S. Department of Justice announced on Nov. 5.

Bai Xu, 28, Zhang Fengfan, 27, and Zhang Zhiyong, 30, were charged in a criminal complaint filed on Nov. 4 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.

Bai and Zhang Fengfan were charged with conspiracy to smuggle biological materials into the United States, while Zhang Zhiyong was charged with making false statements to federal agents.

The three defendants were arrested at the John F. Kennedy International Airport on Oct. 16 and taken into custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement before they could board a flight to China.

Frank Fang reports that The Epoch Times was unable to reach the defendants’ attorneys for comment, but notes that the case is connected to Han Chengxuan, a Chinese scholar at China’s Huazhong University of Science and Technology.

Han was supposed to start research at the University of Michigan in June under a J-1 visa, but was arrested upon her arrival at Detroit Metro Airport that month. She was accused of having shipped, prior to her arrival in the United States, petri dishes containing nematode worms, known as C. elegans, to the university and falsely declaring them on shipping documents.

Han later pleaded no contest to three smuggling charges and to lying to U.S. customs officials and was sentenced to time served in September.

According to the criminal complaint, Han was removed from the United States on Sept. 11.

“Allegedly attempting to smuggle biological materials under the guise of ‘research’ is a serious crime that threatens America’s national and agricultural security,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement on Nov. 5.

“We will remain vigilant to threats like these from foreign nationals who would take advantage of America’s generosity to advance a malicious agenda.”

Shipments

Bai, Zhang Fengfan, and Zhang Zhiyong all came to the United States on J-1 visas as scholars at the University of Michigan, according to the criminal complaint. Bai arrived in the United States in August 2024, and his roommate, Zhang Fengfan, arrived in September 2023. Zhang Zhiyong arrived in September 2021.

On March 5 this year, a UPS shipment from Han, which was addressed to Bai’s apartment in Ann Arbor, Michigan, was intercepted and found by the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) to be “improperly manifested as ‘doc,’” the criminal complaint stated. The shipment included a handwritten note listing 28 DNA molecules, or plasmids, four of which were related to C. elegans.

Prosecutors said the UPS shipment was the source of one of the three smuggling counts to which Han pleaded no contest.

On March 31, CBP officers contacted Bai about the intercepted UPS package, but he was “uncooperative and refused to speak to or meet with the officers,” according to the criminal complaint.

From July 2024 to October 2024, Han also allegedly shipped several packages to Dylan Zhang, whom prosecutors believed to be Zhang Fengfan. According to the criminal complaint, one of the packages, wrongfully manifested as “plastic plates,” included eight petri dishes “containing C. elegans with genetic modifications.”

The shipments sent to Zhang Fengfan from Sept. 23 and Sept. 29 in the same year were the source of two of the three smuggling counts to which Han pleaded no contest, according to prosecutors.

Zhang Zhiyong sent a package to the University of Michigan in 2019 containing nematodes in petri dishes, but manifested as “plastic plates,” according to the criminal complaint.

Han Chengxuan

After Han was removed from the United States, the University of Michigan conducted an internal investigation. According to prosecutors, the three defendants “each refused to participate in the investigation” and were subsequently terminated by the university.

On Oct. 8, the University of Michigan terminated the three defendants’ records on the Department of Homeland Security’s Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS), prosecutors said, explaining that the move meant that they were “no longer in compliance with their J-1 visas.” Afterward, the Department of Homeland Security considered them “eligible for removal,” according to the criminal complaint.

U.S. customs officials interviewed the three defendants at the John F. Kennedy International Airport on Oct. 16, according to the criminal complaint. The trio identified Han as a member of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Prosecutors noted that Han began her doctoral studies at Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST) in 2020, with Liu Jianfen as her adviser.

According to Liu’s personal page on HUST’s website, he currently serves as president of the school’s College of Life Science and Technology and head of its Key Laboratory of Molecular Biophysics of China’s Ministry of Education.

In 2012, Liu was awarded funding as a distinguished scholar by the state-run National Natural Science Foundation of China, according to his personal page.

Zhang Fengfan told U.S. customs officials that he was flying back to China to continue his second-year doctorate program at HUST under Liu, according to prosecutors.

There have been other smuggling cases connected to the University of Michigan in recent months.

Jian Yunqing, a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Michigan, was charged with conspiring with her boyfriend, Liu Zunyong, to bring a fungus known as Fusarium graminearum into the United States. The fungus can devastate wheat, barley, maize, and rice and cause health problems in humans and livestock.

Jian and Liu were charged in June with visa fraud, conspiracy, making false statements, and smuggling a pathogen into the United States.

Rep. John Moolenaar (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Select Committee on the CCP, called on university leaders to conduct internal reviews to protect their research from “China’s adversarial actions,” according to a Nov. 5 statement.

“These new charges reveal an organized network of scholars engaged in illegal activity on Michigan’s campus. It is part of a broader, coordinated campaign targeting universities across the country, driven by China’s efforts to acquire American technology,” Moolenaar said.