A half-dozen smugglers shipped raw goose and duck intestines from China into the U.S., flouting food safety rules to sell the prohibited bird innards to New York City restaurants, federal prosecutors said Tuesday.
The suspects, who live in Queens and Brooklyn, were busted on charges of importing and selling illegal merchandise.
The U.S. bars the import of a number of food items from China, including duck blood and duck and goose intestines, but that didn’t prevent the suspects from setting up several shipments in 2022 and 2023, according to court filings.
The intestines are often served in hot pot dishes, while duck blood products are added to dishes like vermicelli soup.
The goods would come in through the Port of Long Beach in California, and the suspects would often then ship them on domestic flights to Kennedy Airport. From there, they’d be taken to a walk-in freezer in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, the feds allege.
One shipping container that arrived in Long Beach was falsely labeled “1,966 cartons of pet grooming tool pet nail clippers,” and in some cases, the contraband intestines were hidden under packaged rattlesnakes, the feds allege.
A federal food safety investigator searched the walk-in freezer in November 2022, and found 79 cartons with 1,800 pounds of illegal goose intestines and 960 pounds of illegal duck intestines, the feds allege.
In June, the United States Department of Agriculture raided the garage of Chu Feng Food Wholesale, which belongs to one of the suspects, and found 6,496 pounds of illegal goose, duck, pork and beef merchandise worth about $147,300, the feds allege.
The suspects — wholesalers Hangming Fang and Shangqing Ou, and transporters Ming Huang Chen, Runhua Hou, Hangting Lin and Minghao Lin — were arraigned in Brooklyn Federal Court on Tuesday afternoon. Fang was ordered placed under house arrest until Monday, when he’ll present a bail package; the other five were released on bond.
