Asian restaurant owners in Maine have become targets for sophisticated and often lucrative burglaries at the hands of well-organized, highly advanced home invaders.
Apart from their nationality and their ownership of small-businesses, the victims in this crime spree also have one other thing in common: police suspect they have ties to the black-market marijuana trafficking operations that have proliferated throughout Maine in the past four years.
What’s more, law enforcement believe the perpetrators of these break-ins are members of criminal organizations with insider knowledge of where to find large stockpiles of cash.
“We’re asking anyone with knowledge of these burglaries to come to us with information that could help us advance our investigation,” said Brewer Police Department Deputy Chief Chris Martin.
“Based on the information we have so far, we believe that these burglaries are related to other organized criminal activities in the state and that the perpetrators are targeting homes based on insider knowledge of that activity,” said Martin.
Martin said he was aware of at least three burglaries in Penobscot County in which the victims were Asian restaurant owners, though he declined to elaborate on the business owners’ potential ties to illicit marijuana cultivation.
The Maine Wire has been able to confirm the locations of three burglaries, which occurred in January, that targeted Asian restaurant owners, one each in Bangor, Brewer, and Hampden.
A fourth location in Athens, an unlicensed cannabis grow, was burglarized last month, but the owner does not appear to have connections to any restaurants or businesses in Maine.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, in a memo that leaked last year, said it believes more than 270 properties in Maine are illegally cultivating and trafficking cannabis at the behest of Asian Transnational Criminal Organizations. The memo indicated that profits from these illicit activities were subsidizing narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, and even being sent back to sources in mainland China.
Since that memo leaked, Maine police agencies have executed more than 40 search warrants throughout Maine on illegal cannabis grows, arresting exclusively individuals of Chinese descent from outside of Maine in the process. The U.S. Justice Department has also moved to seize at least six properties involved in the illegal activities.
In testimony to the Maine State Legislature earlier this year, a representative from the Attorney General’s office asserted that, while some of the illegal cannabis from Chinese-owned grows is being sold in Maine, the majority of it is trafficked across the southern border to Massachusetts and New York.
The illegally grown cannabis is often laced with pesticides, fungicides, and other harmful chemicals. The competition from illegal growers—who skip out on fees, taxes, and costly regulatory compliance—has made it harder for legal cannabis businesses to operate in Maine.
According to briefing materials from the New England State Police Information Network (NESPIN) reviewed by the Maine Wire, the burglaries have ranged from the Bangor-Brewer area to as far south as Portland, Brunswick, Westbrook, and even other states, like Connecticut.
The crimes all bear certain other similar characteristics, in addition to the identities and vocations of the victims.
For example, the thieves typically leave without snagging high-value items, including jewelry, tech products, and designer clothing — all items that are typically targeted in most home intrusions. The intruders often use high-tech surveillance and anti-surveillance equipment on their targets prior to and during a break-in.
The nature of the home invasions, the identities of the targets, and the apparent insider knowledge of drug trafficking organizations needed to pull off the heists has led law enforcement to suspect that the culprits in the break-ins are other, potentially competing criminal organizations.
“Our concern right now is that somebody is targeting, or some group of people, is targeting specifically Asian business owners,” a police investigator familiar with the New England-wide pattern of burglaries told the Maine Wire.
“That seems to be the primary link. People that own restaurants or salons or spas, their houses where they primarily store money or goods of some other sort is the primary target right now of these burglaries,” the investigator said.
“I think it has to be somebody that has intimate knowledge of how Chinese families work, the fact that they keep money in their houses, where they keep money in their houses, what their schedule is like,” they said. “These aren’t just random.”
The law enforcement source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to speak publicly, said that in most instances where an Asian business owner had been burglarized, police also discovered the owner or residents of the house had ties to properties in Maine that are suspected of being illegal marijuana grows.
Although the full losses from the burglaries often go unreported, the source estimated that the home invaders are making off with $50,000 to $100,000 or more in perfectly untraceable cash.
“The amount of money that they have in their house is not from the restaurants,” the investigator said. “And then we found out after the fact that they had several [cannabis] grows that are unlicensed and illegal,” the source said.
The fact pattern has led law enforcement to the conclusion that the break-ins are targeting the cash proceeds of illegal drug trafficking.
The investigator said that in the few cases where victims did contact police regarding burglaries, the residences appeared to have been “cleaned” before law enforcement arrived.
The level of technology used to facilitate the burglaries also implies a high-degree of planning and sophistication.
In some cases, in Maine, burglars have used Wi-Fi jamming devices, sometimes called “stunters,” to disrupt Wi-Fi internet signals within a given radius.
Given that many commonly available home security cameras — such as Blink cameras from Amazon — rely on Wi-Fi connections to transmit signals to central computer systems, the Wi-Fi jammers have the effect of rendering security cameras inoperable. While the jammers are running, the cameras won’t record.
Although Wi-Fi jammers are illegal to sell or use in the U.S., the products were briefly available for sale on Amazon as recently as March 2024, when the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) began investigating the company for marketing and selling the banned devices.
A law enforcement source from southern Maine, who also asked to remain anonymous, said the break-ins in the southern part of the state often involved GPS tracking devices placed on victims’ cars, as well as surveillance cameras used to monitor the victims’ homes. The combination of surveillance tech, the source said, allowed the burglars to access the home and scour the location for cash while knowing the occupants wouldn’t be present.
Several police photographs inspected by the Maine Wire showed wireless security cameras found at properties in New England that had been burglarized. The cameras had been camouflaged with green and brown fabric and tape. According to information reviewed by the Maine Wire, the disguised cameras were hidden around target properties and connected to mobile internet devices, such as SIM card-enabled hotspots. Such devices would allow perpetrators to monitor an intended target 24/7 without relying on local Wi-Fi routers.
One of the Maine locations that was burglarized belonged to Tong Q. Lu, the owner of China Wok on Broadway in Bangor.
In a previous report, the Maine Wire revealed that Lu, who is a registered electrician’s helper, has worked with Martin Vachon, a master electrician, to upgrade the electrical systems of more than 35 Chinese-owned marijuana grows throughout the state of Maine.
[RELATED: Bangor Business Owner Linked to Illicit Marijuana Grows…]
In two unusually candid interviews, Vachon revealed that he and Lu have cooperated extensively with illegal Chinese marijuana growers throughout the state. In one interview, Vachon revealed that Lu had talked with him about the break-ins that Asian growers in Maine were experiencing.
On the same evening thieves hit one of Lu’s properties in Bangor, a residence on Washington Street in Brewer was targeted.
That home belongs to Jun Jie Huang, whose family owns the nearby Four Seasons Restaurant in Brewer via Four Seasons Chinese Restaurant LLC.
Huang confirmed during an in-person interview that his home was burglarized earlier this year. He said he’d contacted the police regarding the incident but had heard no recent updates about the status of the investigation.
Huang did contact the Brewer Police Department, Deputy Chief Martin confirmed, but only seven days after the burglary.
When officers arrived at his home to conduct an interview, multiple individuals were present, but only Huang communicated with them in English. As officers from the Brewer PD conducted an interview, the other members of the household conversed in Cantonese.
While the Cantonese-speakers rightly assumed that the officers could not understand their conversation, they seemed unaware that the Axon body cameras the officers wore were recording audio and could later be translated. When the Brewer PD had the audio translated, what they learned was revealing.
Although Huang seemed interested in recovering his stolen money and gave indications that he might even know who was responsible for the theft, the translated conversation revealed that Huang wasn’t sharing everything the group knew.
In Cantonese, Huang’s housemates were discussing a pattern that included several other burglaries all over the state, as well as potential culprits.
For investigators, the translated conversation pointed toward a high level of communication and interconnection among the illegal Chinese marijuana growers throughout Maine.
It also suggested that a burglary spree targeting Asian business owners had gone largely unreported to law enforcement. More alarming: it raised a new concern, the prospect of an equally coordinated response to the burglaries.
Huang and another resident of the Washington Street property, Jun Xiang Huang, acquired several additional properties throughout Maine beginning in 2020, including in Woodville, Edinburg, Hermon, and Milford.
According to state electrical records, Jun X. Huang listed the Kelly Rd. property in Hermon as a cannabis cultivation site when it was upgraded to commercial-grade electricity in Dec. 2023. However, according to Hermon’s local ordinances, cultivating marijuana for retail purposes is prohibited in the town.
The Greenfield Road property in Milton, owned by Huang, appeared to be a dormant or abandoned marijuana grow when the Maine Wire visited this summer. According to Woodville town officials, one of the Huang’s properties in Woodville appeared so vandalized on a recent town inspection that the property has been condemned.
When the Maine Wire visited the Four Seasons last month, a cardboard sign in the door explained the the restaurant had temporarily closed as the family was returning to China for an extended visit.
The Maine Wire can confirm that a third burglary occurred last month at a residence in Athens that is described in state electrical records as a cannabis grow.
Following that burglary, an individual related to the property visited the town office to report the crime and was referred to the Somerset County Sheriff’s Office.
Although the individual who reported the crime is unknown, the property was purchased by Jianmei Chen, of Brooklyn, in Dec. 2022.
The Sheriff’s Office declined to comment on the incident, citing its ongoing investigation.
Several law enforcement sources told the Maine Wire that continued burglaries would increase the risk of a response from Chinese criminal organizations – and potentially a violent response.
“Organized crime is essentially an illegal business, and their goal is to be profitable. Loss of triad profits could represent an entire grow cycle, and losses are not welcome in organized crime,” said Rep. Donnie Ardell (R-Monticello), a retired federal investigator for the Department of Homeland Security.
Ardell, whose prior career included work for Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), has also served on the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency Aroostook County Task Force. He said the responses that follow when a cartel or triad are robbed are often predictable.
“In my experience, organized crime operations that lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash or product to law enforcement seizures, for example, have resulted in violent retribution either internally, or violent ‘replacement’ of upper management who are ultimately held responsible for the success, or the failures, of the operation,” Ardell said.
“Since organized crime can’t go to the police for help, I would expect triad internal security efforts to prevent the burglaries to increase dramatically and include armed security,” said Ardell. “As a result, inter-and intra-gang violence is likely to escalate.”
“In these situations, somebody always pays — and sometimes with their lives,” he said.
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Lith over two hundred grow houses left to raid what are the State police waiting for?
israel is a terrorist state.
Fact.
Fort Fairfield Journal is way better.
Maine’s Excessive Electricity Rates Due to Legislative Extortion to Fund Solar Farms
https://www.fortfairfieldjournal.com/ffj/2024/09042401a.html
P.S
Blowing up thousands of pagers /cell phones is terrorism.
Coming to your town, soon
Esau, right again!
We were told that making cannabis would reduce crime. Again the Government lied. the Gov. is just interested in tax money.
Doubt they re Asians
Sounds like NYers
Deport the filth.
The VP has a gun. What kind? where did she take the courses to get a permit? where does she keep it? Has she taken it to NY or Ma? Does the separate service know the answers? What is she afraid of? OR IS IT JUST A LIE.