Illegal immigrant sentenced to 8 years for smuggling weapons to North Korea

An illegal immigrant accused of exporting shipments of firearms, ammunition and other military items that were concealed inside shipping containers to North Korea was sentenced Monday to eight years in prison. 

Shenghua Wen, 42, of the Los Angeles suburb of Ontario, had been in federal custody since December 2024 before pleading guilty in June to one count of conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and one count of acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government.

Wen, a Chinese citizen, entered the United States in 2012 on a student visa and remained in the U.S. illegally after the visa expired in December 2013, the Justice Department said. Before entering the U.S., Wen met with North Korean government officials at that country’s embassy in China where they asked him to procure goods on behalf of the communist state. 

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“Wen and some co-conspirators successfully shipped firearms and ammunition to North Korea by concealing the items inside shipping containers that were shipped from Long Beach, Calif., through Hong Kong, China, to North Korea,” federal prosecutors said. 

On Aug. 14, authorities seized two devices – a chemical threat identification device and a hand-held broadband receiver that detects eavesdropping devices — at Wen’s home that he intended to send to North Korea, the Justice Department said. On Sept. 6, law enforcement seized approximately 50,000 rounds of 9mm ammunition that Wen allegedly obtained to send to North Korea.

Messages retrieved from Wen’s cellphones revealed discussions with co-conspirators about shipping military-grade equipment to North Korea. Some of these messages include photographs that Wen sent of items controlled for export under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said in a December news release. 

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From January to April 2024, Wen sent emails and text messages to a U.S.-based broker about obtaining a civilian plane engine. There also were several text messages on Wen’s iPhone about price negotiations for the plane and its engine.

North Korean officials wired Wen $2 million to get the firearms and other items. He told investigators that he believed the North Korean government wanted the weapons and ammunition for a potential attack on South Korea.

With the money, Wen was able to pay for an armory and a federal firearm license for $150,000 and listed his partner’s name as the business owner to register with the Texas Secretary of State. 

In an effort to fly under the radar and avoid detection by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), he had others purchase firearms for him, authorities said. 

“Once the straw purchasers gave WEN the firearms, he transported them to California, packed the firearms into a shipping container, and shipped the container to China, knowing that it would be transferred to North Korea,” court documents state.