A wanted drug kingpin fled Taiwan in 2014, built a false identity, and spent years convincing Georgia’s coastal city of Batumi that he was a transformative foreign investor. This is the story of how a convicted methamphetamine manufacturer ran a multi-million-pound corporate empire while Interpol and Taiwanese police searched for him.

A Fugitive Drug Criminal Arrives in Batumi

In May 2022, FC Dinamo Batumi welcomed a new honorary president. A ceremony at the club’s stadium drew cameras, dignitaries, and a plaque. The man at the centre of it all was Thomas Xu, introduced as the founder of Lixin Group, a Cambodian real estate conglomerate. He had just signed a sponsorship deal with one of Georgia’s top football clubs.

That ceremony was the peak of a sophisticated public relations push. Georgian media outlet Primetime published a profile of Xu describing how he had fallen so in love with Batumi that he brought his family to live there. He reportedly planned to invest one billion Georgian lari (approximately £290 million) through Lixin Group.

Images of Xu on a private jet and at a ski resort circulated alongside architectural renderings of the Halcyon, a flagship luxury development. After a seven-storey residential building collapsed in Batumi in October 2021, Lixin Group donated more than $100,000 to the victims. The company then sponsored a local summer festival and a volleyball tournament.

Thomas Xu looked like the perfect investor. He was not.

The Man Behind the Name: A Wanted Drug Kingpin

Public records and court documents obtained by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and its partners reveal that Thomas Xu is in fact Hsu Ming-chin. Taiwan convicted him of manufacturing crystal methamphetamine. Taiwanese authorities have listed him as a fugitive drug criminal on the wanted database of the High Prosecutors Office since 2014.

His criminal story began in October 2009 in Kaohsiung, a southern Taiwanese industrial city. At 29, Hsu Ming-chin recruited a chemically trained associate to produce crystal methamphetamine. Their first attempt went badly. The engineer failed to wear protective gloves, created a static electrical charge, and ignited nearby hydrogen gas. He spent five days in hospital with burns. Hsu Ming-chin ordered him back to work immediately.

Courts later convicted Hsu Ming-chin under Taiwan’s Narcotics Hazard Prevention Act and Civil Registration Act. He received a prison sentence. Before he could serve it in full, he left Taiwan in 2014 on a forged passport and never returned.

Building a New Identity to Hide From Justice

Taiwanese police files reviewed by OCCRP show that Hsu Ming-chin relocated to Cambodia, where his older brother Hsu Ming-chao had already built a presence in the country’s growing property market.

In October 2018, Hsu Ming-chin used a fraudulently obtained document to secure a Philippine passport. He listed the name Xu Dong Enriquez and gave Quezon City as his birthplace. He then used that passport to obtain Cambodian citizenship in 2019 under a new name: Thomas Xu.

The audacity is hard to overstate. A wanted drug kingpin had erased his original identity and walked back into public life as a Cambodian businessman. He now carried a clean passport and a corporate title.

His brother Hsu Ming-chao, who also goes by Kevin Hsu, had been building Lixin Group since the mid-2010s. Several Cambodian companies took shape in 2015 with Hsu Ming-chao as director, including Lixin Construction Co Ltd. The group carries no single legal registration but operates under a shared brand, complete with a polished website and promotional materials that name Thomas Xu as chairman.

Buying Political Favour

Lixin Group moved quickly to build relationships with Cambodia’s political class. At a 2018 groundbreaking ceremony for the CEO Center development in Phnom Penh, both Hsu brothers stood alongside Hun To, the nephew of then-Prime Minister Hun Sen. Within twelve months, Hun To held a 25 per cent share and a directorship in one of Lixin’s property development companies.

The brothers donated to the Cambodian Red Cross, which Hun Sen’s wife runs. In 2023, they sponsored a full biography of Hun Sen, launched at a formal ceremony in Phnom Penh. A Lixin social media post called it important to raise awareness of Hun Sen’s “legendary” story and described the group as “intrinsically linked to the Cambodian government and people.”

Lixin also pursued major development projects beyond the capital. Near the coastal casino hub of Sihanoukville, the group announced plans for an entire new city. Promotional renderings for the project bore a striking resemblance to a Zaha Hadid Architects design commissioned for a separate development in Shenzhen, China.

The UN Report That Named the Kingpin’s Network

In April 2025, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) published a major report titled Inflection Point: Global Implications of Scam Centres, Underground Banking and Illicit Online Marketplaces in Southeast Asia. It profiled a Cambodia-based property developer under the pseudonym “Business Group 2” or “BG 2.”

Multiple people involved in preparing the report confirmed to OCCRP that “BG 2” was Lixin Group. They spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of UN proceedings. The report described the group as a “major Mekong-based criminal enterprise” started by two Taiwanese nationals, one of whom remained a wanted drug kingpin in Taiwan. UNODC noted the group had registered at least 25 companies in Georgia, some linked to properties and businesses connected to reports of cyber-enabled fraud.

The report also flagged Lixin’s football sponsorship. UNODC wrote that BG 2 had “invested millions of dollars to become the main sponsor of a top-flight Georgian football club, demonstrating its sustained effort to expand its legitimate public-facing brand.”

OCCRP and partners separately uncovered Chinese court judgements finding that a company called “Lixin” in Cambodia directed Chinese workers to commit large-scale fraud through scam call centres. Lixin Group has never faced formal charges for cyber fraud.

Lawyers for Lixin rejected every allegation. They told OCCRP their client had no involvement in illegal gambling or fraud. They described Thomas Xu’s role as Lixin’s chairman as “factually incorrect.” After OCCRP sent its questions, Lixin removed all references to Xu as chairman from its website and YouTube channel.

Tied to a Major Drug Trafficking Network

Investigators believe the fugitive drug criminal Hsu Ming-chin never fully left the drug trade behind. In April 2016, a Taiwanese ship captain and five crew members sailed for Japan on a vessel called La Gaeta, a Malaysia-flagged catamaran. They met a second boat in the East China Sea and took on cargo. Japanese customs officers boarded La Gaeta in Okinawa on 10 May 2016 and found 597 kilograms of methamphetamine. At the time, it was a record seizure.

Three Japanese court judgements reviewed by OCCRP partner The Reporter set out what investigators found next. Taiwanese police flew to Okinawa to interview the ship’s captain. Their enquiries pointed to Hsu Ming-chin as the organiser of the shipment. He has not faced formal charges. Taiwan holds no extradition treaty with Cambodia.

Two law enforcement agencies and internal UNODC presentations concluded the methamphetamine likely came from the Sam Gor syndicate, a transnational criminal network producing much of its supply in Myanmar’s Golden Triangle. Police in Myanmar and Australia discovered photographs of La Gaeta’s cargo on the mobile phone of a suspected Sam Gor operative arrested at Yangon airport.

The numbers tell a larger story. UNODC data shows methamphetamine seizures across East and Southeast Asia hit record levels in 2023, with authorities confiscating more than 190 tonnes. The Golden Triangle region accounts for the vast majority of global supply.

Wanted Drug Kingpin Hides Assets Under Scrutiny

Back in Georgia, scrutiny began to mount and assets started moving. Xu transferred his £3.8 million stake in the Halcyon development to his romantic partner, Cheng Ya-Wen. She paid nothing for it. She then transferred that stake, along with two other Georgian companies she had incorporated, Lixin Travel and Lixin Trading, directly to Hsu Ming-chao.

OCCRP reviewed corporate filings confirming that shares in Lixin Construction Georgia went to Hsu Ming-chao, listed in the documents as a Cambodian citizen, at no cost.

After OCCRP journalists contacted Lixin for comment, the company restructured. On 29 July 2025, Cheng Ya-Wen lost her directorship at Business Center Pirimze, a Tbilisi property holding. Hsu Ming-chao replaced her. Then on 5 August 2025, the day after lawyers received follow-up questions, Cheng also lost her directorship at Lixin Construction.

The Primetime media article featuring Xu and his family went offline in early August 2025. The Halcyon site in Batumi still sits undeveloped today, tangled in a legal dispute. Lixin’s partner in that project, Turkish-Georgian businessman Galip Öztürk, received a drug conviction in 2023. Turkish courts also convicted Öztürk of murder. He is at large.

Georgia’s Warning Sign

The case has alarmed transparency campaigners. Malkhaz Chkadua, the Batumi office coordinator for Transparency International Georgia, told OCCRP that Xu’s investments exposed “the weakness of public and institutional oversight” in the country.

“No one has shown interest in uncovering what kind of financial groups and interests actually stand behind the so-called major investor,” Chkadua said.

The UNODC report went further. It flagged Batumi specifically, warning that the city “has been increasingly associated with online gambling and cyber-enabled fraud operations similar to those documented in Southeast Asia.”

“Batumi may be turning into an attractive destination for transnational criminal actors,” Chkadua warned. “The interests of residents and the city’s urban development are largely disregarded.”

The Thomas Xu story is a sharp reminder of how illicit money moves. A convicted methamphetamine manufacturer from Taiwan reinvented himself through forged documents, Cambodian citizenship, political donations, charitable giving, and football sponsorships. He built what looked like a legitimate property empire. It took an international team of investigative journalists and a United Nations report to begin exposing it.

Taiwan’s wanted notice for Hsu Ming-chin remains active. Thomas Xu has not responded to any requests for comment.

Reporting by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and partners. Fact-checking by the OCCRP Fact-Checking Desk. Research and data expertise by OCCRP’s Research and Data Team.

Source: occrp