Linda Sun, the former assistant to the New York governor, is linked to accusations that she used her position to benefit the Chinese government, according to a modest indictment against her unsealed husband on Tuesday. They are facing new allegations.
San, who serves as Governor Kathy Hochul's deputy chief of staff and a lower-level position in the management of his predecessor Andrew M. Cuomo, has been accused of violating the Bribery and Foreign Agent Registration Act in accordance with the charges. It's there. It has not been sealed in the U.S. District Court in Brooklyn. The indictment does not include new criminal charges against Sun, but prosecutors have indicted her husband, Chris Who, with three new money launderings.
Both defendants pleaded not guilty during the hearing before Judge Brian M. Cogan on Tuesday.
Sun's attorney, Jarrod L. Schaefer, said the new indictment was not “a serious remedy error already identified in previous indictments.” Hu's lawyer Seth Ducharme said the new accusations were no surprise and that they wouldn't “add much” to the case.
In September, federal prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York accused Who of money laundering and Sun of 10 detectives who failed to register as a foreign agent. Prosecutors accused her of using her government's position to benefit the Chinese Communist Party and acting modestly as a representative of Beijing.
According to prosecutors, San removed references to Taiwan from New York State Communications, blocking Taiwanese officials from the governor's office, and converting them to stop those officials from meeting with state leaders. We accepted a luxurious gift including salted shipping.
San also used her role to assure her that Hochur did not publicly discuss the light letter of Uyghur, a predominantly Muslim ethnic group in China that faced persecution from the Communist Party. The prosecutor said.
Department of Justice officials, particularly the prosecutors of the Eastern District, have cracked down on Beijing's secret efforts to influence U.S. policies and curb the opposition in recent years. In August, Queen's man Shu Jun Wang was found guilty of spying on Chinese dissidents. In December, a man pleaded guilty to running a secret police post base in Manhattan on behalf of the Chinese government.
President Trump's newly confirmed attorney general, Pam Bondy, issued a memo last week asking prosecutors to take the enforcement of the Foreign Agent Registration Act. Prosecutors in recent years have used the law to secretly tackle people on behalf of foreign governments, including Trump's former national security adviser Michael Flynn.
