Mexico brings tax charges against man fighting extradition in $205 million cash seizure case

Mexico adds tax charges in $205 million cash case

MEXICO CITY — Mexican prosecutors added tax evasion charges to drug counts pending against a Chinese-Mexican businessman who is fighting extradition from the United States, the Attorney General’s Office announced Friday.

The office says a judge has issued an arrest warrant for Zhenli Ye Gon, who is accused of evading about 66 million pesos ($5.2 million) in taxes in 2006.

In 2007, police found $205 million in cash during a raid on Ye Gon’s Mexico City mansion, money prosecutors say came from selling precursor chemicals to methamphetamine traffickers.

Ye Gon claimed that the substance seized was a legitimate pharmaceutical chemical intended for use in a medicine factory he was building in Mexico.

Ye Gon was jailed in the United States more than two years ago on charges of smuggling methamphetamines from Mexico to the United States.

A U.S. district judge threw out the charges in 2009 after one prosecution witness recanted and another refused to testify, but he remains in custody there because of the pending extradition request from Mexico on trafficking allegations.

The charges announced Friday will not be added to the extradition request, the Mexican prosecutor’s office said.