• Fuqin (Lily) Che and Qiang (Michael) Fu will forfeit $2.2 million in assets to the Crown. 
• They were convicted under anti-money-laundering law for moving $53m for a Chinese businessman. 
• The forfeited assets include a house, $500,000 in cash, a Maserati and a Mercedes. 

A mother and son involved in a suspicious multimillion-dollar money-handling scheme have agreed to hand over about $2.2 million in property to the Crown, including a house and two cars – a Maserati and a Mercedes. 

Fuqin (Lily) Che, Qiang (Michael) Fu and their company, Jiaxin Finance, have already been prosecuted, convicted and fined almost $2.9m after an investigation into large-scale money remittances coming from China. 

The pair were prosecuted by the Department of Internal Affairs under the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Act 2009. 

Separately, police obtained restraining orders under the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act 2009 over two houses in Auckland, along with $500,000 in cash, a 2015 Maserati and a 2011 Mercedez Benz, all taken from Che and Fu. 

The assets were seized in police raids in July 2016, shortly after the Internal Affairs investigation ended. 

The cash was made up of $472,000 found in the living area of a house Che and Fu shared, and $28,000 found in Fu’s bedroom. 

The Internal Affairs prosecution later alleged Jiaxin was a family enterprise in which Fu, the sole director and shareholder, and his mother, Che, were running a racket at the behest of a businessman living in Canada, Xiaohua (Edward) Gong. 

Gong has been described by High Court Justice Christine Gordon as a “Chinese national and fraudster” who defrauded investors in a pyramid scheme of hundreds of millions of dollars. 

The mother and son appealed unsuccessfully against their convictions and sentence, with their barrister, Ron Mansfield KC, arguing they did not know Gong was involved in any unlawful activity. 

The prosecution case alleged Gong used New Zealand to launder proceeds from the illegal Chinese pyramid scheme. 

Che and Fu were found guilty by High Court Justice Tracey Walker of failing to keep adequate records, and failing to report 311 suspicious transactions totalling about $53m between April 2015 and May 2016. 

Jiaxin Finance Ltd, which has since been deregistered, was fined $2.25m. Lily Che was fined $202,000 and Michael Fu $180,000. 

After they unsuccessfully appealed their convictions to the Court of Appeal and then failed to get leave to take their case to the Supreme Court, the Commissioner of Police applied for the forfeiture of two houses belonging to the pair, the cash seized from their home, and the two cars. 

Subsequent negotiations reached a settlement under which Che and Fu would surrender one of the houses, the cash, the cars and a further $400,000 as a “settlement sum”, which could be raised by borrowing against the second house. 

The settlement agreement between Che, Fu and the police was approved recently by Justice Gordon in the High Court at Auckland. 

The approximate value of the property being forfeited is $2.2m. 

Che and Fu will be allowed to keep equity of about $366,000 from the assets which were formerly restrained. 

The Proceeds of Crime (Recovery) Act is used by police to seize assets which have been acquired and “tainted” by “significant” criminal activity. 

It is often used against gang members and others involved in drug-dealing, but has been used for financial and other white-collar crimes also. 

Ric Stevens spent many years working for the former New Zealand Press Association news agency, including as a political reporter at Parliament, before holding senior positions at various daily newspapers. He joined NZME’s Open Justice team in 2022 and is based in Hawke’s Bay. His writing in the crime and justice sphere is informed by four years of front-line experience as a probation officer.