Photo Courtesy of Google
Zhang was allegedly seen loading cases of cigarettes into a vehicle on this Bell Boulevard block.
By Forum Staff
A Flushing man has been charged with illegal distribution of untaxed cigarettes that, if sold legally, would have generated over $200,000 in revenue for the State.
District Attorney Brown said, “Smokers may see untaxed cigarettes as a bargain, but it cheats everyone – other taxpayers and those who use state-funded programs that depend on tax revenue. Cigarette smuggling to evade sales taxes is a multimillion dollar industry. It is a highly profitable tax-free, cash business for those involved. And the victims are taxpayers who must dig deeper into their pockets and pay higher taxes because of these kinds of schemes.”
Baocheng Zhang, 33, was arraigned last week on a complaint charging him with second- and third-degree attempted grand larceny and violation of the New York State cigarette and tobacco products tax law. If convicted, he faces up to seven years in prison.
According to the criminal charges, on Monday, Oct. 17, Zhang was allegedly observed at 9:20 a.m. loading 22 cases of cigarettes into a 2015 Toyota Sienna parked in front of 42-06 Bell Blvd. Authorities executed a court-authorized search warrant for the vehicle at the scene and 1,047 cartons of untaxed cigarettes containing 209,400 individual cigarettes were confiscated. The cigarettes, if sold legally, would have generated more than $70,000 in tax revenue. Law enforcement agents also found a storage unit receipt in the vehicle, and at 6 p.m. that same day, another court-authorized search warrant was executed at U-Haul Self Storage on College Point Boulevard, unit A158. Investigators recovered an additional 611 cartons that contained 122,200 individual cigarettes. If sold legally, the cigarettes would have generated more than $40,000 in tax revenue.
Search warrants were issued for two additional storage units at the same facility last Tuesday and upon their execution an additional 1,541 cartons were discovered in storage units A145 and A146. In these units, tables and razors were set up to cut open boxes and repackage the cigarettes for distribution. If sold legally, the recovered cigarettes would have generated $102,938.80 in taxes.
In total, said District Attorney Brown, more than 3,000 cartons of cigarettes- containing more than 600,000 individual cigarettes – were allegedly recovered from the vehicle and the storage units. The street value for all of the cigarettes totaled more than $250,000.
