The State Department is offering up to $5 million for information leading to the arrest or conviction of a Chinese national suspected of leading an international fentanyl trafficking ring.
According to a press release Monday, Zhang Jian allegedly led a criminal organization that imported and distributed fentanyl in the U.S. between 2013 and 2016.
The reward is being offered by the State Department’s Transnational Organized Crime Rewards Program (TOCRP). Over 75 criminals and drug traffickers have been captured under the TOCRP and the Narcotics Rewards Program since 1986. The State Department has paid more than $135 million in rewards.
According to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) Zhang, also known as “Hong Kong Zaron,” is the supposed owner of a biotech company in China’s Shandong province that was allegedly used to sell illegal substances throughout the U.S. and Canada. Zhang’s organization is suspected of producing fentanyl in no less than four labs in China, then selling the drug over the internet. According to federal officials, the majority of illicit fentanyl is manufactured in China.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that deaths involving synthetic opioids such as fentanyl increased more than 15% between 2018 and 2019. The agency also reports that synthetics account for 73% of all opioid-related deaths in 2019
In a January 2018 indictment, North Dakota federal prosecutors charged Zhang and several other U.S. and foreign nationals with drug trafficking and money laundering.
The indictment is connected to Operation Denial, an ongoing investigation into drug trafficking cases involving fentanyl and analogous drugs brought into the U.S. from China.
The investigation started in Jan. 2015 after an 18-year-old North Dakota woman died of a fentanyl overdose. More than 30 defendants, including two alleged trafficking leaders accused of operating the ring from a Canadian prison, have also been indicted.
