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Globe Interviews Reedley Code Enforcement Officer in Mysterious Chinese COVID Lab Case
‘We’ve never had a biological lab in the United States busted before’
By Katy Grimes, July 31, 2023 5:23 pm
Why does California keep tripping up against China whenever there is a sketchy COVID issue?
We may not have the answer yet, but at least we are peeling back the layers of the mysterious Chinese COVID lab in Reedley, CA which code enforcement officers discovered.
The Globe spoke with Reedley Code Enforcement Officer Jesalyn Harper, and it was fruitful.
The original lab was in Fresno and was being operated by Universal Meditech, Inc., which received a business license from the State of California March 20, 2019 – exactly one year to the day before Gov. Gavin Newsom’s State of Emergency Order locking down the entire state over the COVID-19 virus.
(Photo: Reedley code enforcement)
On August 26, 2020, there was an electrical fire in the Universal Meditech, Inc., Fresno warehouse facility on Fortune Avenue and Northpoint Drive, ABC30 reported.
Universal Meditech operated a lab inside the warehouse, but because of the Fire and Water sprinkler damage, more recently learned they were about to be evicted, and were facing bankruptcy. That is when Prestige Biotech ostensibly took over and hastily moved everything in October 2022 to the Reedley warehouse for storage, sublet from a cabinet and countertop business called Alliance. There was a recycling business on the property as well.
I asked who was in charge of the move from the Fresno warehouse to the Reedley warehouse. Officer Harper said it was difficult to determine that with several people identifying as associated with Prestige Biotech, but only as friends and doing a favor for the owner.
Ms. Harper said she received the abatement warrant, which covers all of the abandoned items in the warehouse on I Street. She said the record owner of the Property is AY-NC-LP, and the official tenant of the Property is Prestige Biotech, Inc. The Property consists of a 1.73-acre parcel lot with an industrial warehouse.
As the MidValley Times reported last week, the building has been illegally operated since October 2022 by Wang Zhaolin of Prestige Biotech, and the lab was used to produce COVID-19 tests and pregnancy tests. The early report said the mice were genetically engineered to catch and carry COVID-19 – for what purpose is unsettling.
“From May 2 through May 4, the CDC’s Division of Select Agents and Toxins inspected 850 I Street. Court documents confirm the CDC found potentially infectious agents at the location. These included both bacterial and viral agents, including: chlamydia, E. Coli, streptococcus pneumonia, hepatitis B and C, herpes 1 and 5 and rubella. The CDC also found samples of malaria.”
Harper said the Property was being used to store various unknown chemicals, so the City of Reedley involved the California Department of Toxic Substances Control (“DTSC”), the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the California Department of Public Health (“CDPH”), and the Fresno County Department of Public Health in its investigation of the Property.
(Photo: Reedley code enforcement)
Where the story gets sticky is when Officer Harper made numerous attempts to contact the owner of Prestige Biotech, Inc.
The owner, Xiuqin Yao, told Harper in an email that she lives in China and could only communicate by email. “We tried to make telephone communications with her,” Harper said, because while most of the property was components – machines, furniture, freezers, etc. – there were nearly 1,000 live mice which needed daily care. “And then she brought in a consultant, but we were still unable to establish whether Prestige Biolabs or Universal Meditech was the owner of the mice.”
“We’ve been through three different representatives of the company – they quit and a new person arrives, and we start all over.” She said not a single person represented as operating the business. “Several came forward, and then some claimed they were friends of the owner.”
“That is why we ended up moving forward with abatement.” She said it was apparent when they went inside of the warehouse, “they had packed and moved in a hurry – it was haphazard,” according to Officer Harper. And the live mice were in the abandoned warehouse living in inhumane conditions according to the Veterinarian Reedley code enforcement hired to assess them. The mice were eventually euthanized.
“On March 17, 2023, I received an email from a Xiuquin Yao, who indicated that they were the President of Prestige Biotech, Inc.,” Officer Harper said. She got the runaround. “I exchanged emails with Yao from March 19 to March 27, 2023, and inquired as to whether they could provide any licenses or certifications permitting the experiments and breeding of these mice. They never provided any certifications or licenses from any state or federal agency that permitted the activities being conducted on the Property. I informed them that the mice were being kept in inadequate conditions in overcrowded cages and there was a lack of food and water for the mice. No plan was given by Yao regarding a plan to care for the mice, or where the mice would be moved since the building was red tagged following the City’s inspection.”
Harper said nothing was properly labeled, nor was it transferred from the old warehouse properly – i.e. they moved without the requisite permits. Officer Harper learned that typically to move chemicals and biologicals requires a permit from the U.S. Department of Transportation, as well as county environmental health permits.
I asked if what kind of charges – criminal or civil – they were looking at for Prestige Biotech and/or Universal Meditech, when Officer Harper said she just learned of an interesting loophole – privately funded Research and Development labs aren’t required to register with the government. If they were operating under federal or state grants, they would have been required to obtain all kinds of permits.
Someone affiliated with Universal Meditech, Inc., and/or Prestige Biotech, Inc., either discovered the legal loophole, or someone in the state assisted them with the legalities. “This is unprecedented,” Officer Harper said. “We’ve never had a biological lab in the United States busted before.”
“They did their homework to figure out how to move from Fresno without licenses,” she added.
And, apparently mice are also a loophole. “They are the only animal unprotected under the USDA – they are not subject to regulations,” Officer Harper said. “Rats are regulated, but mice are not.”
At this point, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control has bowed out and the Federal EPA is taking the lead on the chemicals in the abandoned lab.
Officer Harper said the California Department of Public Health jumped in and got the biological materials addressed. The medical devices have to be destroyed she said, if the owner is not willing to cooperate.
The Globe will have more reports on the Mysterious Chinese COVID lab in Reedley.
Here is the Declaration of Jesalyn Harper, Reedley Code Enforcement, in Application for Abatement Warrant. Be sure to scroll through the document to the attached exhibits.
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March 20, 2023 -
“…the mice were genetically engineered to catch and carry COVID-19 – for what purpose is unsettling…” the purpose is obvious: GMO mice were being used as reference tests for the COVID, chlamydia and HIV tests the company was trying to develop on the cheap. That’s how they check if the tests being developed are accurate or not. They were trying so hard to keep it cheap that they set up their unlicensed development sites in Fresno and Reedly. But the obvious reason for the GMO test animals was testing, not to spread COVID.
Do some research into these companies’ payroll and tax ID. There’s a high probability that they were playing fast-and-loose with payroll tax money, violating labor and safety standards and generally going rogue. They have that in common with meth labs, but that’s about it.
The intent of these weird and possibly malevolent activities is still a mystery, but it is interesting and actually heartening to see a true investigative report that, at this rate, will likely unravel what this is all about and who is at the bottom of this. An odd money-making scheme or something more sinister? Intriguing that the business license was issued exactly a year before Newsom’s Covid state lockdown. Also in this latest chapter was very impressed to see a Code Enforcement Officer (Jesalyn Harper) who really knows her onions and the law.
YES, she is a rarity! If there had been your typical lackadaisical Code Enforcement Officer out there (as SOP in most cities) there’s no telling how far this could have gone.
Nice investigative journalism! Thanks for covering this story. Millions of people work in these sweatshops
all over the country and nobody cares.
I feel like there might be a few changes in the law, if the mainstream media was repoting it.
Oops….reporting
Privately funded??? there must be away to find out where the money came from. If it came from organizations operating on state and federal grants would the loophole still apply?
another way for China to take over the US or kill us all. I guess the Democrats that vote for people like Nusem think they will be protected. Wake up California. vote to save us not destroy us
Seems that this ‘unethical Lab, is the work of the Chinese Gov’t, with Our ‘Corrupt Politicos like Newsom, HIDING His being part of the scheme; perhaps Newsom is being paid REAL BIG MONEY on the SIDE, to allow this lab into Ca. a “Once Great State he is DESTROYING, along w/Aunt Nancy Pelosi, and the rest of the Corrupt Dems, as Newsom has a ‘dream of being president…..NEVER, as he ucked up Ca. and Now, want to do likewise to the whole Nation!!!