Hong Kong men sought after drug deal ends with student shot dead, dumped in sea

Australian police are hunting two Hong Kong men after a young student was shot dead in a HK$21 million drug deal gone wrong.

The body of 20-year-old business student Jamie Gao was found floating off the coast of Sydney wrapped in a blue tarpaulin last Monday. He had been shot twice in the chest.

Gao's violent death and the hunt for the two men who drove to the drug meet with him is the latest in a string of recent incidents that highlight the key role Hong Kong organised crime groups play in the multibillion-dollar methamphetamine smuggling business between the SAR and Australia.

Two notorious former New South Wales police officers, Roger Rogerson and Glen McNamara, have been charged with the killing, which took place after Gao allegedly met them as part of a methamphetamine deal worth A$3 million (HK$21 million). A week before he went missing Gao appeared in court over accusations of abduction and assault.

According to authorities, the two Hong Kong men may hold important clues as to why a student with no prior record of drug offences was in possession - and selling - a 3.1kg consignment of methamphetamine.

Australian media reports have suggested that the men supplied the drugs to Gao, whose mother was holidaying in Hong Kong at the time of his death.