Barely 152.4cm tall and slightly built, Chen Jingping has mastered the art of looking frail and demure. It is a talent that has served her well -- few who have met her can believe that she is capable of harsh language, let alone acts of violence.
The truth, however, is rather different. The 37-year-old Chen, better known as Sister Ping, is one of the most ruthless gang leaders in Europe. In the past six years, she has made millions by trafficking human beings from her native China into the UK.
Ping is believed to have smuggled more than 200,000 men and women into the EU and her organization has been linked to the deaths of 58 Chinese, whose bodies were found in an air-tight truck at Dover in June 2000.
A growing,
illegal trade
According to the UK' National Criminal Intelligence Service, organized immigration crime is one of the fastest-growing areas of the underworld. At least 600,000 people enter the EU illegally each year and around 80 percent are brought in by underworld gangs known as "snakeheads." Ping was the top snakehead in Europe.
The smuggling industry is as lucrative as the drug trade -- across Europe the business is worth ?8 billion -- but for those who are caught the penalties are far lower.
Point-to-point
smuggling
A spokesman for the National Criminal Intelligence Service said: "The top snakeheads control the facilitation process from end to end. They have contacts in China, the UK and at every stop along the route."
Using a combination of violence and intimidation, Sister Ping swept all her rivals aside and cornered the people-smuggling market between Holland and Britain soon after arriving in Rotterdam in 1997.
Through her connections to the Triads -- her boyfriend is the head of the Triad gang 14k in Rotterdam -- she was able to hire muscle to do her dirty work whenever necessary. In one case, a man had several teeth broken when the barrel of a gun was pushed into his mouth. In another, a man was beaten so badly that he was left with punctured intestines.
Typical triad
negotiator
When a rival mobster tried to muscle in on Sister Ping's territory, she made a big show of inviting him to the Orient restaurant in Rotterdam's Chinatown, the headquarters of her operation, ostensibly to discuss ways of dividing the territory between them. As soon as he was inside, he was dragged up to the first floor, beaten with a hammer and then shot in both legs.
According to police, Ping's smuggling operation was a well-oiled machine. With at least a dozen people on the payroll, a fleet of eight cars, several other vehicles and at least seven safe houses, the overheads alone were ?35,000 per month.
Reorganizing
lives
Potential migrants would be approached in China and, after paying a hefty deposit, would be transported via a number of routes to Holland.
Once there, they would be held at safe houses for several weeks, waiting for an opportunity to travel to the UK. In the UK they would either claim asylum or be whisked off to work in low-paid, unskilled jobs. Ping's earnings are unknown, but in one recorded telephone conversation a key member of her organization was heard boasting that he had earned ?300,000 in two months.
The best estimates suggest that she earned at least ?15 million from her criminal activities.
Dutch police picked up Sister Ping's trail after Rotterdam-based Turkish gangster Guersel Ozkam was jailed in Holland in connection with the deaths at Dover. At the time, Ozkam was said to be the head of the smuggling operation and was given a 10-year jail sentence.
Although police suspected that he had been taking orders from above, Ozkam refused to name Ping. It was left to Ozkam's ex-girlfriend to contact the police and point them in the right direction.
Caught
in the end
Within hours of the deaths at Dover, Ping had gone into hiding, but was eventually tracked down through a massive police operation.
Last month a Dutch court sentenced Sister Ping to three years in jail and fined her ?8,000 for offences related to human trafficking.
Despite Ping's conviction, the trade in human cargo shows now sign of slowing down. When a small three-bedroom house on the Fairstead Estate in west Norfolk burst into flames in the early hours last month, firemen were shocked to discover 18 Chinese workers sleeping there. All escaped alive.
Super-cheap labor
It has since emerged that at least 1,500 Chinese workers have moved into the King's Lynn area on England's east coast in the past year, most of them working in food processing or farming, often for as little as ?2 per hour.
Police intelligence suggests that the snakeheads are now using areas such as Norfolk, Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire, all in eastern England, as final destinations for newcomers because there is more work and cheaper housing than can be found in London.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in