A man accused of operating a clandestine Chinese spy outpost in New York City has been found guilty of acting as an illegal foreign agent and destroying text messages from a Chinese government handler. The conviction of Lu Jianwang, also known as Harry Lu, came on Wednesday in Brooklyn federal court.
Verdict and Charges
Lu, 64, was acquitted of a related conspiracy charge. The case highlighted tensions between U.S. concerns over China's crackdown on pro-democracy dissidents and the defense's argument that prosecutors exaggerated a bureaucratic error by a well-meaning Chinese American community leader.
Speaking to supporters after leaving court, Lu declined to answer reporters' questions. His lawyer, John Carman, stated that federal prosecutors had dressed up a mundane paperwork case with unfounded suggestions of spying and intelligence gathering.
Lu remains free on bail pending sentencing, which has not yet been scheduled.
Allegations and Evidence
According to prosecutors, Lu and co-defendant Chen Jinping established the outpost in Manhattan's Chinatown in 2022 after Lu attended a ceremony in China's Fujian province, where the Ministry of Public Security announced it was opening 30 such secret police stations worldwide. China's communist government uses these outposts to monitor individuals it considers enemies of its interests.
During the trial, jurors were shown a large banner from the Chinatown location that read: “Fuzhou Police Overseas Service Station, New York USA.” Chen pleaded guilty in December 2024 to conspiracy to act as a foreign agent.
The defense argued that the outpost was actually a community center where members of the Chinese diaspora could renew Chinese driver's licenses remotely during COVID-19 travel restrictions and gather for ping-pong and mahjong. However, prosecutors countered that even if Lu's only connection to China was through driver's licenses, it violated the foreign agent law.
Background and Raid
The Manhattan outpost shared offices with the America ChangLe Association, a community organization run by Lu and his brother Jimmy. The organization described itself on tax forms as a “social gathering place for Fujianese people.” ChangLe means “eternal joy,” according to Carman.
Prompted by a report from an organization monitoring Chinese transnational repression, the FBI raided the alleged outpost on October 3, 2022. Agents searched drawers and paperwork, broke into locked cabinets and a safe, and seized a computer and cellphones.
The next day, prosecutors said, Lu admitted to FBI agents that he established the outpost, communicated with his handler via WeChat, and deleted those messages.
