The Decibel - An ex-RCMP officer, a real estate tycoon and Operation Fox Hunt

Episode Date: August 24, 2023

Back in July, a former RCMP officer was charged with conducting foreign interference on behalf of China. We now know more about what the RCMP is accusing this officer of doing. And it involves a real estate tycoon, a “hired gun”, and a campaign called Operation Fox Hunt.Steven Chase, senior parliamentary reporter for the Globe, explains.Questions? Comments? Ideas? Email us at [e-mail]

Earlier this summer, there was some pretty big news that you might have missed. A former RCMP officer was arrested and charged with conducting foreign interference on behalf of China. And now, we've learned more about why he was arrested. And it allegedly involves a real estate tycoon, a quote, hired gun, and something called Operation Foxhunt. The Globe's senior parliamentary reporter, Stephen Chase, has been breaking this news. Today, he'll tell us the story of this former officer, what he's accused of, and how it fits into China's broader attempts to influence things here in Canada. I'm Mainika Raman-Welms, and this is The Decibel from The Globe and Mail. Steve, thanks so much for being here today.

Oh, glad to be here. I want to start with this arrest that happened earlier in the summer. Can you just start by telling me, like, what happened there? Sure. Yeah. In July, in late July, we received word from the RCMP that they had arrested a former RCMP officer, William Miker, or Bill Miker, as he's called, and that he'd been charged in a case of foreign interference. And do we know exactly what he was charged with there? Yes, he is accused of helping the Chinese government identify and intimidate a target, a person on Canadian soil. So Mr. Meiker is charged with two counts under the Security of Information Act.

That's the modern name for what we once called the Official Secrets Act. He's charged under Section 22 and Section 23, and they are consecutively preparatory acts for the benefit of foreign entity and conspiracy. So he's being charged with trying to obtain intelligence or information on behalf of the People's Republic of China. OK, so that's what the RCMP said in July when this was happening. It seems like a big deal. I mean, does this does this happen often, Steve, that a former RCMP officer is charged with something like this? No, it's extraordinary.

Foreign interference charges are rare, if almost nonexistent in Canada. And it's also extraordinary to see a former member of the force roped into a case like this. Yeah. Okay. So who is this guy, William Miker, Bill Miker, as you said? What do we actually know about him? So Bill Miker served in the RCMP for more than 20 years, we believe 22 years, and he retired in 2007. He spent a lot of his career working in the white collar crime area, also organized crime and financial crimes. And at the end of his career, he was working in Vancouver. After that, he went into a private work life as a corporate risk investigator. He appears to have set himself up, particularly in Hong Kong, with a company that helped others recover lost or stolen assets.

In fact, in 2016, he founded a corporate risk firm called EMIDR. And his company's website lists intelligence gathering, money laundering as some of its areas of expertise. And the company's website says that the firm specializes in asset recovery. Okay. So how did Micah allegedly become involved with the Chinese government? His work in Hong Kong as a corporate investigator and in recovering assets, he ended up being one of a number of former police detectives that China apparently recruited in places like Australia and other Western countries to help recover millions of dollars that were allegedly proceeds of crime that had been taken out of China illegally. And Mr. Meiker actually spoke to the Australian Broadcasting Company in a 2019 story about exactly what he was doing there.

Bill Micah is a self-described economic mercenary, and the former undercover Canadian police officer runs a private firm out of Hong Kong that's contracted to track and recover China's missing money. As long as we're doing everything lawful and properly, I'm a hired gun to help either large corporates or governments to get back what is rightfully theirs. He was asked about his work for the Ministry of Public Security by these ABC reporters, and he said, I have a commercial relationship with entities that are in themselves associated in some form or another with policing authorities in China. And a big part of their mandate is focused on economic crime, financial crime, and money laundering. So that term, hired gun, that really sticks out there. So he was openly saying the kind of work that he was doing essentially with these government bodies.

Yes. Just to be clear, Steve, he wasn't an RCMP officer when he was doing this work, though, right? He had already left by this time. No, he relocated to Hong Kong very shortly after he left the force. Okay. All right. So that's a bit of background on Micah. Then in July this year, he's arrested. And at the time, we didn't know much about what he was accused of doing. And I know,

Steve, you've learned more about some of the specifics around the RCMP investigation. What can you tell us about what you've learned there? Sure. So when the RCMP charged him, they said that he had been trying to use his network of contacts to help identify and intimidate an individual. But they didn't tell us who that individual was. The Globe has subsequently learned that the person that he is alleged, Mr. Micah is alleged to have targeted, is in fact a wealthy Vancouver real estate entrepreneur named Kevin Sun. And what do we know about Kevin Sun? We don't know a lot

about Kevin Sun. There's very little you can read about him. But what we do know is the RCMP believe that Mr. Sun was the target of a what's called a red notice, that in fact, he was targeted by the Chinese government to recover money that he allegedly stole in banking fraud from a Chinese bank. Again, none of these charges have been proven in court, but that is what the RCMP believed was the reason why the Chinese government was after him. Mr. Sun is, as far as we know, is currently living in Vancouver. And a red notice is basically a worldwide arrest warrant that's put out by Interpol. And I understand, Steve, that this is all part of something called Operation Foxhunt, which honestly, I mean, it sounds like it's something out of a spy thriller.

What is Operation Foxhunt? There's a couple of campaigns that the Chinese government launched 15 years ago, some later, some earlier. They're called Operation Foxhunt and Operation Skynet. And Beijing described and framed these as basically an anti-corruption campaign to track down Chinese citizens or former Chinese citizens who defrauded China, who stole money and fled. But as Western security agencies have warned us, including the FBI and CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, these campaigns were also used to target and silence dissidents. So China would say they're going after somebody because they're a criminal. But in fact, they were really going after somebody because they were a dissident or in some way caused grief to the ruling Chinese Communist Party. And so we believe that, or the RCMP in fact believes,

that Mr. Miker had somehow become involved with helping the Chinese government in its foxhunt or Skynet campaigns. We'll be back in a moment. Okay, so it sounds like the Chinese government, through this Operation Fox Hunt, was targeting Kevin's son. Can you give us any more information Mr. Miker sent an email to a colleague in was about to obtain a red notice against Mr. Sun and that he could use the global arrest warrant to impress upon Mr. Sun that we hold the keys to his future. So the RCMP, again, believes that this was Mr. Miker working on behalf of China to convince Mr. Sun to sort of cut a deal or come in from the cold. And the RCMP also has information that they cite coming from an RCMP officer at the Canadian Embassy in Beijing, later reporting that the Ministry of Public Security in China cancelled a reg notice after negotiations with Mr. Sun

and provided him with a new passport. So in presenting his case for these charges, the RCMP believed that China's settlement with Mr. Sun and provided him with a new passport. So in presenting his case for these charges, the RCMP believed that China's settlement with Mr. Sun matches the intended actions of Mr. Meiker. Okay, interesting. You've also learned, though, that the RCMP thinks Meiker may have targeted other people as well. What do we know about that? Sure, there's a few other cases in which the RCMP believes that Mr. Meiker had been asked by China to investigate people. In October 2017, the RCMP said that Mr. Meiker mentioned in emails to colleagues that he'd been asked by China to gather information on Rabia Qadir and the World Uyghur Congress. She was at that time the president of the Congress. It's unclear if he did any of the work.

And he assured a colleague in an email at one point that he would not do anything that would put him offside with Canada and the U.S. They also alleged he'd been hired by the Chinese government to seek information from Canadian law enforcement contacts about the case of Meng Wanzhou, of course, who was the Huawei executive arrested at the Vancouver airport in 2018 on a U.S. extradition request. You'll recall she was under house arrest in Vancouver for quite a while. Again, it's unclear from the information that we have whether Mr. Meiker did what the RCMP alleged. And finally, in August 2017, the Mounties alleged that Mr. Meiker was given the task by the Public Security Bureau in a particular Chinese province to locate and offer what was called a sweetheart deal to Chinese National Living in New York. In fact, the information we have is that he tried to locate the hospital where this man was being treated for pancreatic cancer in New York so he could tell him that a Chinese warrant for the arrest would be waived if he

cooperated in answering questions posed by the Public Security Bureau. Again, it's unclear from the information we have about this Project Severo investigation whether or not he actually ever contacted Mr. Jianming Sun. Okay, wow. How does the RCMP know this, Steve? Do we know? So it appears that RCMP has gotten access to some emails and other forms of communication that Mr. Micah used to talk with people he worked with about this.

And I imagine this is all really sensitive information. Yeah, I have to hedge a bit when asked about this information because it is all confidential at the moment, and we don't want to discuss more about how we came to learn these things. Can you just help me understand here, Steve? I mean, there's a lot of moving parts. This is a complicated situation. What exactly did William Miker do that was illegal? According to the RCMP, what did he do here that was wrong? That's a good question. I think the fundamental problem in the RCMP's eyes is that Mr. Miker was working on behalf of a foreign government to compel an individual in Canada to cooperate with that foreign government.

And the problem here is the normal course of action should be if the Chinese Ministry of Public Security has a problem with somebody in Canada, they should be going to Canadian authorities and asking for their help, not calling on private investigators to do their bidding. I mean, that's an area we call transnational policing, which, of course, is fraught with its own problems. But that's the way things are supposed to work. The Ministry of Public Security in China is supposed to contact the police authorities in Canada and ask for their cooperation. And if it's all above board and all legitimate, then the RCMP or the other police force should, in theory, cooperate. It shouldn't be turning to private investigators to do your bidding in Canada. And what about Micah? What

has he said about how he got involved in all of this? Well, back in 2015, he actually discussed this openly in Hong Kong with the Hong Kong Foreign Correspondents Club. He actually gave a speech. And he said that in 2014, as Beijing was sort of ramping up Operation Foxhunt, a representative of the Chinese government approached him. And he said he was invited to meet with somebody very close to senior state security. And this person asked him whether he'd be able to help track down money stolen by corrupt officials. What he said to me was, look, Bill, if, for example, we wanted to find money that officials have absconded with, would you be able to help us track it down?

And I said, it all depends on how much information you give me. I said, I wouldn't do it. It's not what I do anymore. But I know guys who do that, and you give them the tools. According to Mr. Meiker, as he explained to the Hong Kong Correspondents Club, they said, Bill, you have informal relationships with police and intelligence services that will allow us to save a lot of time. Like I said, they reached out to me a year ago about, you know, what ability I could to assist them.

And nothing's come of it, of course, but the will and the desire is going to be there to go after people. And I think they're going to hold. So what has Meikers said about the allegations against him now? So we've talked to Mr. Meikers' lawyer, and he said his client, of course, is innocent of the charges and that everything the RCMP has against him is merely circumstantial evidence.

He said he was not hired by any agency to intimidate any person. And in fact, he said he's never met Kevin's son. He said his client has never met Kevin's son or any of the other individuals that the RCMP is alleging he was working to help China track down and target. And he said that he thinks that the RCMP's thought process is misguided and erroneous. And that's about it. And what about Kevin Sun? What does he say about all of this? He's this real estate businessman. He's allegedly targeted by Micah.

What does he have to say about this situation? Well, Mr. Sun's lawyer denied his client negotiated any deal with China. He said Mr. Sun has never met or had any dealings with Mr. Miker and is not willing to voluntarily testify at any trial of the former RCMP officer. He said his client paid off a debt to a Chinese bank in 2013, and that Mr. Sun was not a victim of extortion committed by the Chinese government through its alleged agent, in this case, Mr. Meiker. And he said he has no intention to voluntarily appear as a witness to Mr. Meiker's trial. And he said he's never been interviewed or given any statement to the RCMP about the matters. Steve, what can we make

of that response from Kevin Sun's lawyer? Does that tell you anything? It tells us that Mr. Sun wants nothing to do with the case in which apparently has him as the target. So it suggests to me it's going to be difficult for the RCMP when the alleged target doesn't want any part of this. Just lastly here, Steve, I mean, this sounds like a very complicated story. And I know that you and Bob Fyfe have been reporting for months on China's interference in Canada. So I wonder, Steve, how do you see this story fitting into the broader picture of foreign interference from China in Canada. So Mr. Micah's arrest follows, you know, a half a year of national debate and reporting on rising foreign interference in Canada and how it should be addressed. And the government is right now on the hot seat trying to negotiate with opposition parties a public inquiry that could, you know, lay bare

what's going on here, because the Globe and mail and other media have been reporting on a concerted strategy by beijing to disrupt the democratic process in canada and on how beijing targeted members of parliament like michael chong and what are effectively attempted intimidation i've talked to some security analysts and they feel that the RCMP in all of this is under pressure to demonstrate progress on foreign interference front and that the Micah case reflects their effort to sort of show Canadians that they're doing something about the matter. So, Steve, what are you watching for next year? What do you think might happen? Sure. When the RCMP announced the charges against Mr. Micah in July, Hmm. So, Steve, what are you watching for next here? What do you think might happen? Sure. When the RCMP announced the charges against Mr. Miker in July, they said the investigation is ongoing.

So this is not over. There could be more charges. There'll definitely be more information eventually released in court. And so it's really a case in progress. Steve, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today. You're welcome. That's it for today. I'm Mainika Raman-Wells. Our summer producer is Nagin Nia. Our producers are Madeline White, Cheryl Sutherland, and Rachel Levy-McLaughlin. David Crosby edits the show. Adrian Chung is our senior producer, and Angela Pachenza is our executive editor. Thanks so much for listening, and I'll talk to you tomorrow.