Chinese national has been sentenced to three years in prison for trying to illegally export US military boat engines to China, the Justice Department said on Friday.
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“A Chinese national was sentenced Wednesday to three years and six months in federal prison for conspiring to submit false export information through the federal government’s Automated Export System and to export maritime raiding craft and engines to China fraudulently, and attempting to export that equipment fraudulently in violation of US law,” the Justice Department said in a press release.
Chinese national Ge Songtao, 51, had pleaded guilty in November 2020, the release said. Songtao was the chairman of the Shanghai Breeze Technology company based in China, the release added.
Ge, the 51-year-old chairman and main owner of a business called Shanghai Breeze Technology Co., admitted in a plea agreement last year to having people at his company try to buy and ship to China inflatable rubber “raiding craft” used by military teams including Navy SEALs.
The US military boats and engines Songtao targeted use engines for which there is no equivalent in China, and can operate using gasoline, diesel fuel or jet fuel, according to the release.
In 2019, the Justice Department said in a press release that an active service US Navy officer and his wife along with two Chinese nationals have been charged with plotting to smuggle military-type inflatable small boats and their engines to China.
“Assistant Attorney General John C. Demers and US Attorney Maria Chapa Lopez for the Middle District of Florida announces the return of an indictment today of four individuals, including two Chinese nationals, an active-duty United States Navy officer, and his wife, on charges relating to a conspiracy to unlawfully smuggle military-style inflatable boats, with Evinrude MFE military outboard motors, to the People’s Republic of China,” the release said on Friday.
The four defendants charged are Fan Yang, 34, a naturalized US citizen and US Navy lieutenant, his wife Yang Yang, 33, Ge Songtao, 49, a Chinese citizen and Zheng Yan, 27, another Chinese citizen, the release said.
