17THE INNOCENTS
Betty Warren and Harriet Davis—trim and attractive in their U.S. Army nurses’ uniforms—were wide-eyed with excitement as they looked from the window of the airliner and saw Hong Kong for the first time. The clouds hung low over the peaks of the island jutting from the sea at the edge of Red China. In the harbor they saw great luxury liners at anchor alongside battered old freighters from the four corners of the earth. The harbor was alive with Chinese junks and sampans.
Their excitement grew no less as the plane landed and a bus carried them into the bustle of Kowloon to the Grand Hotel. The hotel would be their headquarters for several days of sightseeing and shopping before they returned to their posts at Yokosuka Army Hospital, and the end of a vacation tour which had included Manila, Calcutta and Bangkok. It was one of the standard tours arranged by the military for personnel stationed in Japan and other Far Eastern bases. And Betty and Harriet, both lieutenants, were only two among the hundreds who made the circuit each year.
Before leaving Yokosuka, a fellow nurse had told them: “When you get to Hong Kong, be sure to look up Mr. Chu in the Miramar Hotel arcade. He’s terribly nice—and honest. He can tell you where to buy things at the cheapest prices and he’ll show youaround Hong Kong. He gets a commission on anything you buy—but it’s worth it.”
The next morning after their arrival, blonde, blue-eyed Betty and dark-haired, brown-eyed Harriet headed toward the Miramar Hotel arcade to find Mr. Chu. They were window-shopping in the arcade when a voice said politely, “Excuse me, please. I am Mr. Chu. Are you Miss Warren and Miss Davis?”
The two women exclaimed in surprise. Betty said, “Yes. But how in the world did you know who we are?”
Chu, a smiling, dapper, middle-aged man, said, “Lieutenant Bess and Lieutenant Marge were here last week. They said you would be in Hong Kong soon. So I have been watching for you. I would be happy to show you around Hong Kong if you wish.”
The next morning, Chu called at the Grand Hotel with a chauffeur-driven car. Obviously to make the girls feel more at ease, he had with him his three-year-old son—a cute, button-eyed boy who stared at the two American women as though they were creatures from another planet.
Soon the four of them were touring Kowloon and the New Territories, the farm land stretching from Kowloon to the border of Red China. Chu entertained them as they went along with a history of the countryside and of the people. They even stood at one end of the bridge at the border, looking into Red China and watching the impassive Red soldier standing guard at the other end with a Russian-made machinegun slung from his shoulder.
Before their Hong Kong stay had ended, Betty and Harriet were as much impressed by Chu’s courtesy and helpfulness as other military personnel had been in years past. Chu had concentrated on building good will among the American military people, with the result that he knew scores of Army, Navy and Air Force men and women throughout the Far East. He carried on a lively correspondence with them, acting as their agent in buying gifts to be shipped to friends and relatives in all parts of the United States. His reputation for fair dealing was impeccable.
On the last day of their stay, Chu called at the Grand Hotel to bid the nurses goodbye. They thanked him profusely for his kindnesses and asked if there was anything that they could do for him.
“If you would be so kind,” Chu said, “I would like for you to deliver some gifts to a relative in Japan.”
He explained that he would have a seaman deliver two suitcases to them at Yokosuka. The cases, which they would be free to open if they wished, would contain a few shirts, some dolls for his relative’s children, and a few other inexpensive gifts. The nurses would not have to bother about delivering them, because his relative would call for them at their quarters. The nurses said they would be delighted to do him a favor. And they bid one another goodbye.
Betty and Harriet were not the only Americans who had sought the services of Mr. Chu that week of February, 1958. Air Force Captain Bob Hampton, a tall, slim young jet fighter pilot, also was one of his customers. Hampton had hitched a ride from Japan to Hong Kong aboard an Air Force transport. He had called on Chu to help him purchase several tailored suits and shirts, a camera, a watch and other gifts.
Before they parted Chu also asked Hampton if he would mind carrying a suitcase back to Japan for his relative, a Mr. Lee. The captain said he would be glad to do him a favor, whereupon Chu brought out a suitcase from the shop where he worked. He opened it to show his friend that it contained only a few dolls, several shirts, ties, and other inexpensive small gifts. Hampton bid Chu goodbye, carrying the suitcase with him as he hurried to catch his plane back to Tokyo.
Soon afterward, Chu once more ran into a friend, Seaman Leslie Brown, a broad-shouldered young native of Los Angeles who had come ashore from the SSPresident Clevelandwhen the big liner docked with its load of ’round-the-world tourists. Chu had met Brown on a previous visit, introducing himself to the lonely sailor he had noticed wandering through the streets of Kowloon and inviting him on a tour of the colony. Brown had repaid Chu by introducing him to other crew members on shopping expeditions.
When they met once again, Chu invited Brown to lunch at a restaurant where waiters brought to the table the most bewildering variety of Chinese food Brown had ever eaten. “This is the best and cheapest food in all Hong Kong,” Chu said.
During the meal, Chu asked Brown if he would do him the favor of delivering a suitcase to a relative, Mr. Lee, in Los Angeles. He explained, as he had to the other Americans, that the suitcase contained only a few gifts.
“Sure,” Brown said, “if there is nothing in it to cause me any trouble.”
Chu assured Brown there would be no trouble. He took him to the home of a friend, Ting Ching-Tsoi, where Mrs. Ting brought out a suitcase. Chu opened it to show Brown that it contained nothing but the gifts he had described. And then he gave Brown $20 for his trouble in delivering the luggage.
That night, Chu also delivered two suitcases to a seaman aboard the USSKearsarge, to be taken to Betty Warren and Harriet Davis in Yokosuka.
Unknowingly, these Americans were innocents in a plot to smuggle millions of dollars worth of narcotics into the United States, either directly or by way of Japan. Each of the suitcases contained a false bottom in which packets of heroin were concealed.
As American and British agents later pieced together the story, Chu himself was unaware that the luggage contained heroin, or that he was being used as a pawn merely because he had so many friends among the military people and seamen who visited Hong Kong.
The plot had its beginning when Chu’s friend, Ting Ching-Tsoi, conceived the idea of using Chu as an unwitting agent in a heroin-smuggling ring. Ting approached Chu with a proposition that they could make a big profit by sending watch parts to the United States, hidden in the false bottoms of suitcases carried by Chu’s American friends. Ting knew that Chu would have nothing to do with narcotics but that his code of ethics would not be violated if he thought he was having his friends smuggle a few watch parts.
Chu agreed to a deal. Ting sent a confederate, Kung Kee-Sun, to nearby Macao, where anything can be bought if one has the cash—and where heroin can be purchased by the pound as easily as a woman can be bought for the night.
Kung smuggled the heroin past the British customs patrol. Then Ting bought several good-quality leather suitcases. He took them to a friend in Kowloon, who inserted false bottoms, fashioned of thin plywood covered with leather. The packages of heroin literally were built into the luggage. The job was so well done that only a careful inspection by an expert would disclose anything wrong.
Then, quite by chance, the system broke down because an Air Force wife became suspicious. When Captain Hampton returned to his home near the Tachikawa air base outside Tokyo, he found that his wife was on a shopping trip into town. He put the suitcase Chu had given him in a closet and promptly forgot about it. He also forgot to inform his wife that a Chinese would be calling for the suitcase later. Then he was suddenly called away from home on a training mission.
While he was gone, a Chinese called at the Hampton home. When Mrs. Hampton opened the door, the Chinese introduced himself as Mr. Ling. He inquired about the gifts which Captain Hampton had brought from Hong Kong from his relative, Mr. Chu. He said he had come for them and would appreciate it if Mrs. Hampton would give him the suitcase.
But Mrs. Hampton knew nothing about gifts in a suitcase. She knew nothing about a Mr. Ling and nothing about a Mr. Chu. “I’m very sorry,” she said, “but you will have to return when my husband is home. He has said nothing to me about it.”
Mr. Ling was visibly upset and seemed not to understand why Mrs. Hampton would not give him the suitcase. But he left, promising to return.
When Hampton returned home, his wife told him of the strange Chinese who had called and how upset he had been when she had refused to turn over a suitcase to him.
“I’m sorry,” Hampton laughed. “I put the suitcase in the closet and forgot all about it.” He explained he had brought it home and was to deliver it to Ling as a favor to Chu. “There’s nothing in it except a few cheap gifts,” he said.
But Mrs. Hampton remembered the sudden distress she had seen in Ling’s eyes when she disclaimed any knowledge of a suitcase. “I don’t like the looks of this at all,” she said. “That man Ling was actually frightened when I wouldn’t give him the suitcase. The loss of a few cheap gifts shouldn’t upset him like that.”
Captain Hampton began to worry that perhaps something was wrong. He checked the contents of the case but saw nothing to get alarmed about. Nevertheless he decided to report the matter to Air Force intelligence officers. When the agents examined the suitcase carefully, they found the hidden narcotics.
The Air Force investigators turned the case over to Japanesepolice. Ling was arrested and finally broke down. He confessed the smuggling plot. He also told investigators about the shipment of narcotics in the suitcases destined for the two Army nurses. These bags were intercepted, and when the bottoms were pried loose, the investigators found that each contained heroin valued at $50,000 on the retail market.
The news of Ling’s arrest reached Chu in Hong Kong. He was appalled that he was being used as a tool in the smuggling of narcotics. He wrote a frantic note to Lieutenants Warren and Davis, urging them to destroy the two suitcases as soon as they arrived, in order to avoid trouble. He apologized to them for causing them any embarrassment or trouble.
And then he wrote a letter to Seaman Leslie Brown. He mailed one copy to Honolulu and another copy to Brown’s home in Los Angeles. He said:
Dear Leslie:I hope this letter will catch you up in Honolulu or Los Angeles. If in San Francisco too late. I want to tell you about the story of the suitcase. It is a very dangerous thing. Please do not take it back to your house. Please keep it board ship and return it to me in Hong Kong, otherwise you will have big troubles. If you already took them home, and have no trouble, please keep it. If some Chinese people try to get it, please do not let any people have it. The best thing is to return to Hong Kong. It is a very dangerous suitcase. Be careful of yourself. You have family and I also have family. I don’t want you and me to have troubles.I am very sorry for everything. Please take my word. Please return me a mail. I am looking forward to hearing from you in the very very soonest.Sincerely yours,Chu
Dear Leslie:
I hope this letter will catch you up in Honolulu or Los Angeles. If in San Francisco too late. I want to tell you about the story of the suitcase. It is a very dangerous thing. Please do not take it back to your house. Please keep it board ship and return it to me in Hong Kong, otherwise you will have big troubles. If you already took them home, and have no trouble, please keep it. If some Chinese people try to get it, please do not let any people have it. The best thing is to return to Hong Kong. It is a very dangerous suitcase. Be careful of yourself. You have family and I also have family. I don’t want you and me to have troubles.
I am very sorry for everything. Please take my word. Please return me a mail. I am looking forward to hearing from you in the very very soonest.
Sincerely yours,Chu
The letter was waiting for Brown when thePresident Clevelandarrived at Honolulu. Again he examined the suitcase closely, and everything that was in it. But he could find nothing that was suspicious. He decided that the best thing to do was to keep the case in his cabin and to take it back to Hong Kong on his next trip.
Brown wrote to Chu, saying:
Dear Chu:Received your letter in Honolulu. Was quite surprised and hurt to know you put me in such a spot after I asked you if there was anythingin the suitcase. We arrive in San Francisco today. I have the suitcase on the ship and will return it to you next trip when I come. That is if nothing happens to me. I have spent every night since then worrying about the spot you put me on.Well, I will close for now. Hope you write and that your children are well.Sincerely yours,Leslie Brown
Dear Chu:
Received your letter in Honolulu. Was quite surprised and hurt to know you put me in such a spot after I asked you if there was anythingin the suitcase. We arrive in San Francisco today. I have the suitcase on the ship and will return it to you next trip when I come. That is if nothing happens to me. I have spent every night since then worrying about the spot you put me on.
Well, I will close for now. Hope you write and that your children are well.
Sincerely yours,Leslie Brown
When thePresident Clevelandreached Los Angeles, Brown left the suitcase in his cabin and hurried ashore to his apartment. He was told that a Mr. Lee, a Chinese, had made several calls inquiring about his return. And within a few minutes after his arrival, there was a knock on his door. Brown opened the door and found that his caller was a Chinese about fifty-five or sixty years of age. He had thin, sharp features and a dark complexion. His hair was turning gray. He was wearing a brown suit and a topcoat.
“I am Mr. Chu’s relative, Mr. Lee,” the visitor said. He asked if Brown had brought the suitcase from Mr. Chu.
“I can’t give it to you,” Brown said. “I got a letter from Chu and he told me to hang on to that suitcase or I’d get in trouble.”
Lee angrily accused Brown of trying to keep the suitcase in order to sell it. He demanded to know where it was.
To prove he still had it as he claimed, Brown took Lee with him aboard theClevelandand showed him the suitcase in his cabin. But he refused to give it to him. Brown had the bag in his cabin when thePresident Clevelandsailed from Los Angeles on the return trip to Hong Kong.
The U.S. Customs agents in San Francisco and Los Angeles were informed by the Customs representative in Tokyo of the developments at that end of the line. By this time they had learned that Brown was involved in the smuggling operation and that he was to make delivery to a Chinese known only as Mr. Lee. But the message from Tokyo arrived after theClevelandhad put to sea.
When theClevelandarrived in Yokohama, Treasury agents in Japan boarded the vessel and asked Brown if he still had the suitcase which had been given to him by the Chinese in Hong Kong. Brown said, “Yes. I know which one you are talking about.” He took them to his cabin and showed them the case. “I have looked it over,” he said, “and I can’t find anything wrong.”
A customs agent went over the suitcase carefully, discoveredthe false bottom, pried out the piece of plywood, and uncovered the cache of heroin. It was estimated to be worth $500,000 at retail prices.
Brown agreed to work with Customs agents when he returned to the United States and to help trap the Chinese who had called on him for the narcotics. The narcotics were turned over to the ship’s captain and Brown was confined to the ship. When the vessel docked in San Francisco the heroin was turned over to Customs agents. Brown was taken in tow by Customs Agent Paul Samaduroff, a blond-haired, broad-shouldered man who had specialized in tracking down West Coast narcotics smugglers.
Samaduroff and other agents in San Francisco suspected that the “Mr. Lee” who had called on Brown in Los Angeles was actually Li Sheung, also known as Shin Lee. He fitted the description which Brown had given the agents when he was questioned in Japan. Li had been on the agents’ wanted list for months—but they had never been able to trap him while he was buying or selling narcotics. Now the chance had come.
The agents placed fake packages of heroin in the false bottom of the suitcase and went with Brown to the bus depot, where the bag was checked in a locker. Then Brown was taken to a telephone, where he placed a call to Li Sheung’s hangout at a shirt shop on Grand Avenue in Chinatown. The shop owner answered the phone and Brown asked if he could talk to Li Sheung. The shop owner said, “You call later, and I’ll see if I can contact him.”
Several times Brown called the shirt shop only to be told to call again. Late that evening the contact was made. A man who identified himself as Li Sheung got on the phone and talked to Brown. Brown identified himself as a seaman aboard thePresident Clevelandand said he had something which he was supposed to deliver to Li Sheung.
“Yes,” Li said, “I remember you in Los Angeles. Why didn’t you give me the suitcase when I was in Los Angeles?”
Brown said that he would explain the whole thing to him when they met. He added, “I have the suitcase here now and I’m supposed to give it to you.”
They agreed to meet in a restaurant in Chinatown. Li Sheung was waiting for Brown when he arrived at the restaurant. Customs agents had placed themselves at strategic points outside the restaurant,and one was seated at a table in the rear of the room when the two men sat down together.
Li Sheung kept referring to the fact that Brown would not give him the suitcase in Los Angeles. He said he could not understand why the delivery had not been made.
Brown said, “That time you came to my house, I thought there was something hidden in the suitcase but I didn’t know what it was. Now I know, and I want some money for my trouble.”
Li Sheung agreed to go with Brown to the bus station to pick up the heroin and to pay him $100. They left the restaurant and got into a cab.
Customs agents, keeping contact with each other by radio, trailed the cab from the restaurant to the bus station, where other agents waited, lounging about the place as though they were travellers. They were watching as Brown went to a baggage locker, took out the bag, and handed it to Li Sheung. The Chinese then counted out $100 and handed it to the seaman. At this point Samaduroff and the other agents moved in and arrested Li Sheung. He was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison.
And Mr. Chu—the amiable, friendly little man in Hong Kong? The British were lenient with him because he was, after all, only the dupe, and he had cooperated in rounding up the smuggling gang. By now, he may have returned to his old job of being helpful to touring Americans.
The Customs files are fat with such cases, in which smuggling rings and individual smugglers have used innocent victims to help them bring jewels, heroin, watch parts, and other small but valuable items into the United States.
One of the innocents in such a plot was dark-eyed, attractive Countess Kyra Kapnist, who arrived in the United States aboard the SSChamplainon September 2, 1937, to join the exclusive fashion house of Marcel Rochas, Inc., of New York City as a model and saleswoman.
Before she left Paris, an official of the firm had informed her that two trunks and a hat box would be added to her baggage when it was delivered to the liner. It was nothing she was to worry about. She would be met on the pier in New York by Mr. Guy Fonte-Joyeuse, vice president of the firm and manager of its New York branch. He would take care of her customs declaration and the baggageinspection. All the countess had to do was to be her charming self and not worry her pretty head about such small details.
And so the countess arrived in New York. On the pier, she was met by Fonte-Joyeuse, a distinguished-looking man accompanied by a fashionably dressed woman. Everything seemed to go as she had been told it would in Paris. Fonte-Joyeuse was extremely solicitous about his new employee. “Give me your customs declaration,” he said, “and I’ll take care of everything.”
He hurried away to find an inspector to examine her baggage. Within a matter of minutes an inspector appeared and peeked into one piece of the countess’ luggage. Then he stamped all the baggage for clearance and the countess was whisked from the pier with her friends. Fonte-Joyeuse seemed unduly elated over her arrival.
Fonte-Joyeuse would not have been so happy had he known that a member of his own firm was an informer for the U.S. Customs Service—and that a letter was even then on its way to the Service advising them that Countess Kapnist’s luggage included two trunks and a hat box containing seventy original gowns and hats valued at approximately $40,000.
Agents opened an investigation and found that Countess Kapnist’s declaration made no mention of dutiable imports. They questioned the inspector who had handled the examination and found that—for a price—he had agreed to feign an examination of trunks and luggage brought into the country by the models and employees designated by Fonte-Joyeuse.
When agents confronted the countess, she willingly told them the whole story. She told them of the instructions given her in Paris, of being met by Fonte-Joyeuse on the pier in New York, and of her surprise when an inspector took the trouble to look at only one small suitcase among all the luggage which she carried with her.
Agents found in the house of Marcel Rochas 104 gowns of French origin, valued at about $60,000, which had been smuggled into the United States by models and others employed by the firm.
Fonte-Joyeuse was indicted on two charges of smuggling and conspiracy. He was sentenced to one year and a day in prison and fined $1,000. He served six months of his sentence and then was released on parole and deported to France. The Parisian fashionsseized from the house of Marcel Rochas were sold at auction. They brought about $9,000 into the U.S. Treasury—of which $2,250 was paid to the Paris informer.