(Minghui.org) Two men, Chen Jun and Lin Feng, have pleaded guilty in U.S. federal court to bribery and illegally acting as Chinese Communist Party (CCP) agents. The two pled guilty in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York on July 24 and 25, 2024. They were arrested in the United States in May 2023, and charged with acting and conspiring to act in the United States as unregistered CCP agents, conspiring to bribe and bribing a public official, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. They also allegedly participated in a CCP-directed scheme targeting U.S.-based practitioners of Falun Gong. The sentencing of Chen Jun (aka John Chen) and Lin Feng (referred to as Feng Lin in official U.S. documents) will be held on October 30 and 31, respectively. They face up to 25 years in prison.

The news was announced by Matthew G. Olsen, Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, Damian Williams, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, and Robert R. Wells, Executive Assistant Director of the National Security Branch of the FBI.

Chen Jun (left) and Lin Feng (right) pleaded guilty in the Southern District of New York Federal Court to illegally acting as CCP agents. 

According to a statement released by the U.S. Department of Justice on July 25, defendants John Chen and Feng Lin bribed IRS officials in an attempt to have them assist in the Chinese government’s transnational suppression of Falun Gong.

Chen Jun, 71, is from the People’s Republic of China. Lin Feng, 44, is a Chinese citizen who resides in Los Angeles, California. They each pleaded guilty to acting as an unregistered agent of the Chinese Communist Party and bribing IRS agents in connection with their alleged conspiracy to target Falun Gong practitioners in the United States.

According to court documents, from at least January 2023 to approximately May 2023, John Chen and Feng Lin worked within the United States at the direction of the CCP government, including a CCP official identified as “CCP Official 1,” to further the CCP’s campaign to suppress and harass Falun Gong practitioners. In China, Falun Gong practitioners face a range of persecution measures from the CCP, including imprisonment.

As part of the CCP’s campaign to persecute Falun Gong, Chen Jun and Lin Feng participated in a plan directed by the CCP to manipulate the IRS whistleblower program in an attempt to deprive the Shen Yun Performing Arts Company, which is run by Falun Gong practitioners, of its tax-exempt status.

After Chen filed a defective whistleblower complaint with the IRS, Chen and Lin paid $5,000 in cash bribes and promised to pay more to an undercover officer posing as an IRS agent in exchange for the agent’s assistance in advancing the complaint. Neither Chen nor Lin informed the Attorney General, as required, that they were acting as agents for the CCP in the United States.

Throughout the scheme, Chen made it clear in a recorded phone call that the bribes were directed and funded by the CCP and were intended to achieve the CCP government’s goal of “overthrowing… Falun Gong.”

In phone conversations captured pursuant to judicially authorized wiretaps, Chen and Lin discussed receiving “instructions” from CCP Official 1 regarding the bribery scheme, deleting instructions received from CCP Official 1 to evade detection, and “sending alarm” and “sounding alarm” to CCP Official 1 if Chen’s and Lin’s plan to bribe the agent did not go as planned. Chen and Lin also discussed that CCP Official 1 was the Chinese government official “in charge” of the bribery scheme targeting Falun Gong.

As part of the scheme, Chen and Lin met with the agent in Newburgh, New York on May 14, 2023. During the meeting, Chen paid the agent a $1,000 cash bribe as an initial bribe.

Chen also offered to pay the agent a total of $50,000 to initiate an audit of Shen Yun Performing Arts, as well as 60% of any whistleblower reward from the IRS, if Chen’s whistleblower complaint was successful. On May 18, 2023, Lin paid the agent an additional $4,000 at John F. Kennedy International Airport as an additional bribe to further the scheme.

Chen and Lin each pleaded guilty to one count of acting as an unregistered agent of a foreign government and one count of bribing a public official. Chen pleaded guilty on July 24 and is scheduled to be sentenced on October 30. Lin pleaded guilty on July 25 and is scheduled to be sentenced on October 31.

Chen and Lin each face a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison.