Operation Avarus-Nightwolf: ‘Accused crime boss? My son’s a good boy’

The mother of accused Chinese money launderer says her son is innocent and has a ‘good heart’.

Chen Zhou, 37, is led away from a property in Melbourne’s Balwyn.

The family of an accused money-laundering kingpin say he’s an honest businessman with a “very good heart” and played no role in the $229m alleged crime syndicate dismantled by police.

Speaking at the family’s $10m Balwyn mansion, raided this week by Australian Federal Police as part of Operation Avarus-Nightwolf, family members claimed Chen Zhou was innocent.

A woman who identified herself as Mr Chen’s mother said police confiscated “everything” from the trophy home, which has been slapped with a restraining order by the AFP.

“My son very good boy,” she told The Australian.

“He is a good boy, very good heart, nothing wrong. My son says ‘mamma, I no do, I no do’.”

The woman blamed individuals she described as “no good people” for the arrest of her 37-year-old son and his partner, Lu Jie, 28, the mother of a 21-month-old child.

The couple are behind bars on charges including conspiring with each other as well as other alleged members of the alleged Long River syndicate to launder proceeds of crime valued at more than $10m.

Referring to Wednesday’s raid that cracked the alleged money-laundering syndicate operating through the Changjiang Currency Exchange wide open, the woman said: “Everything, the police take everything, cars, bags, everything.”

A man at the Knutsford St mansion, who identified himself as Mr Chen’s grandfather, also vouched for the alleged Long River kingpin’s character, saying he was “too good”.

“Some wrong customer, come in, and make trouble,” he said.

Mr Chen appeared in court on Wednesday night and Ms Lu appeared on Thursday. The court was told neither had been in custody before. They are both believed to be Australian citizens of Chinese heritage. Mr Chen faces two charges.

Seven people have now appeared in court over the Long River allegations, and police have restrained 14 properties worth a total of $50.4m, across most mainland states.

They also obtained freezing orders on $7m in cash held in bank accounts by the seven alleged syndicate members.

Financial regulator Austrac also swooped, suspending Changjiang’s remitters licence, bringing a halt to a large international remittance business with 12 shopfronts that had previously been moving up to $100m a day, mainly between Australia and China.

At the company’s outpost in Melbourne’s Swanston St, which also operates as a diagou or shopping and shipment facility, the doors remained open and a handful of customers continued to post items including vitamins and baby powder. Staff there said they knew nothing about the alleged money laundering.

Among the properties seized was a $7.5m home in Kew, whose residents, married couple Qu Ye and Zhu Jing, both 35, appeared in court on Thursday, charged with conspiring to deal with the proceeds of crime to a value of more than $10m.

Other properties restrained by the AFP’s Criminal Assets Confiscation Team included a $6.1m property at Mossman Park in WA, a $5.8m home in Kew, and a $7.4m property in Dandenong South.

Other alleged syndicate members who appeared in the Magistrates Court on Thursday were Wang Ding, 40, of Glen Iris, an Australian citizen; Duan Fei, a 37-year-old Chinese citizen with Australian citizenship, and; Wang Jin, a 33-year-old woman from Vermont, an Australian citizen.

The seven were remanded in custody until March 13. All are expected to make bail applications in the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, former Howard government minister Gary Hardgrave distanced himself from the company, after he was hired by Changjiang to spruik it. He updated his LinkedIn page to delete a listing that referred to him as a director of the company.

“I have immediately terminated all involvement with Changjiang Currency Exchange,’’ Mr Hardgrave said.

“I was never involved in the day-to-day operations, nor at a board level. I presented one video in January 2022 as part of a paid contract but today I feel shocked.”

Mr Hardgrave is not under investigation by law enforcement.