8 Arrested, Guns Seized in Raid on Asian Gangs

Asian gangs in the San Gabriel Valley were targeted Wednesday in a dawn operation involving more than 300 federal, state and local law enforcement officers.

Two adults and six juveniles were arrested, and 32 handguns and assault rifles were seized in what Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies billed as “the largest single-day assault on Asian organized crime in the history of the county.”

Deputies and other officers fanned out through the San Gabriel Valley at 5 a.m., serving search warrants at 27 homes and five businesses from Covina to Alhambra, officials said.

The operation, planned over more than four months, was prompted by increased violence between two rival Asian gangs, the Wah Ching and Hung Mun, said Detective Bill Howell of the Sheriff’s Asian Organized Crime Unit.

Gang members are suspected in several slayings, as well as in numerous carjackings and terrorist threats in the San Gabriel Valley, officials said. They declined to elaborate on the crimes, but a member of the Wah Ching gang is a suspect in the April 5 killing of Kathy May Lee, a 27-year-old Monterey Park woman shot to death during an attempted carjacking in Alhambra. The suspect, a juvenile, is still at large.

The gangs also are involved in illegal gambling, extortion and prostitution, police said.

Arrested were Paul Liu, 32, of El Monte, and Kiet Ng, 27, of Monterey Park. Both were booked into County Jail on suspicion of extortion. Bail for Liu was set at $25,000 and for Ng at $75,000. The juveniles, whose names were not released, were arrested in Walnut and Hacienda Heights.

Although there were few arrests, Howell said the operation yielded valuable documents that may help in other investigations.

“I haven’t even begun to sift through the evidence,” the detective said.

Sheriff’s officials said Wednesday’s operation represents the first step in a lengthy investigation into the problem of Asian organized crime in Southern California.

The Wah Ching gang originated in San Francisco in the early 1960s and by the middle of that decade had begun operating in Southern California, mainly in Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley, Howell said.

“They’re more of a criminal enterprise than a street gang,” the detective said. “They compare to organized crime.”

Gang members prey primarily on the Chinese and Vietnamese population in the county, Howell said. Some Wah Ching members are now businessmen in their mid-40s, he added.

In November, Wah Ching members ranging in age from 15 to 30 broke away to form a rival gang, the Hung Mun, Howell said. That breakup resulted in increased violence in the San Gabriel Valley, he said. The detective declined to provide further information about the gang’s activities.

Other law enforcement agencies whose officers participated in Wednesday’s operation were the FBI, the Internal Revenue Service, U.S. Customs, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the California Highway Patrol, the state Department of Justice, the Los Angeles County Probation Department and the Los Angeles, Alhambra, Monterey Park, San Gabriel, San Marino and West Covina police departments.