Prosecutors in US Midwest charge six Chinese with plot to steal seed corn
Court hears some suspects were found on their knees in farmers' fields stealing ears of corn patented by one of world's leading crop developers
Six men from China, including the chief executive of a conglomerate's seed subsidiary, have been charged with conspiring to steal patented seed corn from two of the leading seed developers in the United States, prosecutors said.
The other five men charged were being sought by federal authorities, Klinefeldt said.
Court documents read like an espionage novel, with men found crawling on their knees in cornfields stealing corn ears and federal agents obtaining court orders to tap the mobile phone and bug the rental car of the chief executive of Kings Nower Seed, a subsidiary of Beijing-based conglomerate DBN Group.
The FBI also placed GPS tracking devices on cars and tracked the men as they moved around the countryside stopping at cornfields and buying bags of seed from dealers in Iowa and the state of Missouri.
Kings Nower Seed did not immediately reply to an e-mail message seeking comment.
The other men charged are Li Shaoming, chief executive of Kings Nower Seed, employees Wang Lei, Ye Jian, and Lin Young, who all live in China, and Wang Hongwei, a dual citizen of China and Canada, who lives in Canada.