Zhi Dong — alias “Brother Wang” — would have arrived in Cuba with falsified documentation after fleeing from Mexico and after being expelled from Russia.
CDMX, Mexico. – Mexico intensifies efforts to regain custody of Chinese kingpin Zhi Dong —alias “Brother Wang”—, a priority of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). The drug trafficker was arrested in Cuba after being expelled from Russia, where he arrived with a false passport after fleeing from Mexico City, according to reports The Country official Mexican sources, which stated that the Government of Claudia Sheinbaum He waits for the Cuban authorities to conclude their interrogation to receive him and “automatically” proceed with his delivery to the United States.
According to the report, Zhi Dong was arrested in the fall of 2024 in Mexico City and is considered a priority target for the United States. The DEA accuses him of leading a criminal structure since at least 2016 that supplies the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), with bases in Los Angeles (California) and Atlanta (Georgia), and connections in Central America, South America, Europe and Asia, according to The Country.
The leak that set off the alarms occurred on July 11. Zhi Dong was transferred from a maximum security prison to house arrest by a judge’s decision and escaped despite being in military custody. The president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, publicly criticized that resolution: “The judge, without any argument, because the Prosecutor’s Office was fighting and giving all the arguments, gave him house arrest. He should not have had that resolution from a judge.” “How is it possible?” he added, while stating that his Government has insisted “on the corruption of the Judiciary.”
All this has happened while Mexico negotiates with Washington a security agreement in which fentanyl appears as a priority. The same capital judge issued a similar measure in favor of former prosecutor Jesús Murillo Karam, prosecuted for forced disappearance and torture in the Ayotzinapa case.
Six days before the escape, a federal court in Georgia had brought new charges against Zhi Dong for money laundering. According to The Countrythe accusation attributes him to laundering at least $20 million between 2020 and 2021 through a network of more than 150 shell companies and 170 bank accounts. The scheme—described in the complaint accessed by the Spanish newspaper—operated with a “Mexican cell” in charge of collecting cash from drug sales, and a “Chinese cell” dedicated to entering and moving those funds through the corporate and banking framework.
The court document reviewed details fractional deposits in accounts in different states—Georgia, California, Illinois, New York and Michigan—for amounts that did not exceed $100,000. The operations were carried out in banks such as Bank of America, JP Morgan or Wells Fargo, “because ‘those banks are used to receiving large sums of money without asking too many questions,'” the publication quotes. The majority of the transfers were directed to Mnemosyne International Trading Inc., one of the front companies linked to Zhi Dong, the report added.
The siege on the organization tightened after the arrest of Ruipeng Li, the network operator from whom hundreds of bank documents related to Zhi Dong were seized, according to information from The Country. The DEA investigation includes interceptions of calls and messages, as well as monitoring safe houses. To communicate, the structure used codes: “Coffee” for fentanyl and “Food” for cocaine. Anti-drug agency calculations estimate more than 1,000 kilos of cocaine and almost 2,000 kilos of fentanyl transported from Mexico to the United States.
The Country It also reproduces the physical description and aliases attributed to Zhi Dong in the complaint: born in Beijing in 1987, just over 1.70 meters tall and weighing about 80 kilos; black hair and brown eyes. Nicknames: Brother Wang, El Chino, Tocayo, Pancho and Nelson Mandela. The noted kingpin would have used multiple identities and false passports to move between America, Asia and Europe until his failed attempt to enter Russia and his arrival in Cuba with falsified documentation, according to the same media.
With Zhi Dong in custody on the island and waiting for the interrogation to conclude, the Mexican authorities are confident of receiving him to send him to the United States, according to the sources consulted by The Country. The newspaper concludes that, after his latest adventures, the fate of “Brother Wang” seems closer to an American prison.
