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FRESNO, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) - A idiosyncratic described arsenic the "romantic and concern partner" of the 62-year-old amerciable Reedley laboratory relation was named by the Department of Justice connected Thursday arsenic a 38-year-old Chinese citizen.
According to national officials, 62-year-old Jia Bei Zhu, a national of China, was antecedently indicted for distributing adulterated and misbranded COVID-19 trial kits and making mendacious statements to authorities astir his individuality and engagement with the installation successful Reedley.
The caller indictment released Thursday identified Zhu’s romanticist and concern spouse arsenic 38-year-old Zhaoyan Wang and established that Wang was facing national charges alongside Zhu. The superseding indictment named Wang arsenic the "romantic and concern partner" of Zhu - and included national charges against some of them.
The Department of Justice alleges that some Wang and Zhu operated the biolabs Universal Meditech Inc. (UMI) and Prestige Biotech Inc. (PBI) successful Fresno and Reedley.
According to tribunal documents, the 12-count superseding indictment alleges that from August 2020 done March 2023, some Zhu and Wang conspired to defraud buyers of Universal Meditech Inc. (UMI) and Prestige Biotech Inc.'s (PBI) COVID-19 trial kits, importing kits from China and telling buyers the kits were made successful the United States. The Department of Justice alleges that this was done by declaring them arsenic gestation trial kits. They besides falsely claimed that the trial kits were approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which allowed Zhu and Wang to marque implicit $1.7 cardinal done the fraud.
The Department of Justice says Zhu remains successful custody pending his trial, acceptable for Sept. 11. However, Wang is not successful custody.
If convicted, Zhu and Wang each look a maximum of 20 years successful situation for the conspiracy and ligament fraud charges and an further 3 years successful situation for the organisation of adulterated and misbranded aesculapian instrumentality charges.
