International meth kingpin or persecuted businessman?

In March, Mexican police raided a luxurious mansion in Mexico City, finding $207 million in cash stashed in steel cabinets and hidden inside false walls. The house belonged to suspected drug kingpin Zhenli Ye Gon. During the raid, police arrested Ye Gon’s wife and six relatives.  The Chinese-Mexican pharmaceutical bigwig was accused of illegally importing ...

600360_zhenli_05.jpg
600360_zhenli_05.jpg

In March, Mexican police raided a luxurious mansion in Mexico City, finding $207 million in cash stashed in steel cabinets and hidden inside false walls. The house belonged to suspected drug kingpin Zhenli Ye Gon. During the raid, police arrested Ye Gon's wife and six relatives. 

In March, Mexican police raided a luxurious mansion in Mexico City, finding $207 million in cash stashed in steel cabinets and hidden inside false walls. The house belonged to suspected drug kingpin Zhenli Ye Gon. During the raid, police arrested Ye Gon’s wife and six relatives. 

The Chinese-Mexican pharmaceutical bigwig was accused of illegally importing enough chemicals to manufacture nearly 37 metric tons of methamphetamine with a street value of over $700 million. But Ye Gon didn’t stick around to find out what the consequences might be, and he went into hiding.

Later, Ye Gon held a secret news conference in which he constructed a defense of thrilling grandiosity. The money was foisted on him by an associate of Mexican President Felipe Calderon under threat of blackmail, he claimed, to fund “terrorist activities” in case Calderon fell to his challenger in the presidential election.

On Monday, U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency officers finally arrested Ye Gon in Silver Spring, Maryland. Agents dragged him away from a meal of codfish and baby carrots—humble fare for a man who once boasted his own fleet of luxury cars and mistresses across the globe.

Of course, in the event that said codfish came from Ye Gon’s home country of China, his timely arrest may have spared him an even worse fate.

Sam duPont is a Master's candidate at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School and focused his capstone research on transitional democracies and elections in fragile states.

More from Foreign Policy

Children are hooked up to IV drips on the stairs at a children's hospital in Beijing.
Children are hooked up to IV drips on the stairs at a children's hospital in Beijing.

Chinese Hospitals Are Housing Another Deadly Outbreak

Authorities are covering up the spread of antibiotic-resistant pneumonia.

Henry Kissinger during an interview in Washington in August 1980.
Henry Kissinger during an interview in Washington in August 1980.

Henry Kissinger, Colossus on the World Stage

The late statesman was a master of realpolitik—whom some regarded as a war criminal.

A Ukrainian soldier in helmet and fatigues holds a cell phone and looks up at the night sky as an explosion lights up the horizon behind him.
A Ukrainian soldier in helmet and fatigues holds a cell phone and looks up at the night sky as an explosion lights up the horizon behind him.

The West’s False Choice in Ukraine

The crossroads is not between war and compromise, but between victory and defeat.

Illustrated portraits of Reps. MIke Gallagher, right, and Raja Krishnamoorthi
Illustrated portraits of Reps. MIke Gallagher, right, and Raja Krishnamoorthi

The Masterminds

Washington wants to get tough on China, and the leaders of the House China Committee are in the driver’s seat.