In June, Operation Rider saw $650,000 worth of assets restrained after multiple properties were raided across Auckland. Video / Supplied
A car dealer who was sent to prison alongside disgraced former radio personality Nate Nauer after both men pleaded guilty to helping the Comancheros launder drug money has asked a judge to reduce his sentence to home detention.
Yonghao “Chris” Huang was ordered by an Auckland District Court judge in May to serve a sentence of two years and eight months’ imprisonment.
Nauer, a former Mai FM morning host, laundered about $420,000 of drug money through multiple cash purchases of high-end cars through Huang’s business, Baili Enterprise Ltd. In coded messages between the two, Nauer would refer to the cash payments as “noodles”.
Both men pleaded guilty to six counts of money laundering and Nauer received a sentence of two years and nine months’ imprisonment - one month longer than Huang’s.
That’s unfair, Huang’s lawyer argued today in the High Court at Auckland.
While Huang might have been “reckless” as to where the money was coming from and therefore guilty of laundering, he certainly didn’t have the “intimate knowledge that the other accused had” of its origin as gang drug trafficking profits, said Paul Dacre KC.
“Mr Nauer is most involved and most knowledgable about the circumstances,” Dacre said, suggesting to Justice Gerard van Bohemen that there should have been a wider gulf between the two men’s sentences “to reflect the different roles and different knowledge”.
Nauer and a third defendant, Vetekina Naufahu, had a separate sentence appeal hearing last month before a different judge. The result of that hearing is yet to be determined.
Nate Nauer was sentenced to two years, nine months' imprisonment, to be served concurrently after he pleaded guilty to six money laundering charges. Photo / Brett Phibbs
Naufahu, the brother of the Comancheros’ New Zealand president, pleaded guilty to two money laundering charges and was sentenced to two years and four months’ imprisonment. Authorities said he laundered money by paying over $75,000 in rent via cash and by paying $16,000 for silicone calf implants to make his legs look more muscular.
Defence lawyer Ron Mansfield KC, who represents both Nauer and Naufahu, has described Nauer’s jail term as “inappropriate” and manifestly excessive. Naufahu’s sentence was also too long, he argued last month.
A 2019 and 2020 investigation into the trio, dubbed Operation Rider by police, revealed purchases of a $100,000 BMW X5 for Nauer’s partner, a $176,000 Mercedes Benz E63 that was later seized from the home of Comancheros leader Seiana Fakaosilea, a $50,000 BMW M5 and two vehicles that were later seized from Naufahu’s home: a $178,000 Audi RS6 and a $275,000 Mercedes Benz G wagon.
“[I’ll] just have an even better car next time,” Naufahu taunted police during the June 2020 seizure.
Each of the vehicles had been allowed to remain registered in the name of Huang’s company in an effort to mask the recipients’ names, court documents state.
During today’s hearing, Huang’s lawyer pointed out that his client did not receive a large profit from the transactions. Dacre said his client also should have received greater credit for his previous good character.
Crown prosecutor Belle Archibald said it’s unclear in the summary of facts how much financial benefit Huang received from the transactions, but it’s clear he made some. The modest good character discount he received was adequate, she said, when considering the transactions took place over the course of months - meaning it wasn’t a one-time lapse in judgment.
“I have to acknowledge [the discounts given by the District Court judge] weren’t generous, but they were within the appropriate range,” she said.
Justice van Bohemen said he would reserve his own judgment until after the appeal decision for Nauer and Naufahu is issued.
Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.
