AT the height of his charmed criminal career, Chun Yeung bought 10-kilogram parcels of opium from rebels in the jungles of Burma for $5,000 and sold them for as much as $25 million. That was with the right connections.
And Chun, 40, arguably the territory's most prolific trafficker but who on Monday lost $57 million in an asset forfeiture case after being given a 25-year jail sentence, had some of the best contacts in the business.
He had personal rapport with Khun Sa, Thailand's warlord of drugs, now reportedly considering retirement amid defections from his cabal.
When it suited him, Chun also traded cash for drugs with Khun Sa's warring rivals. They included the Nga family, who reportedly maintain the dangerous route to mainland China, and the Cheung clan, unofficially responsible for the Thai border. It was a risky yet profitable business.
'It is seldom that we have people like him, who organised the deals with the warlords in Burma and controlled the drugs through all the stages, right up to the delivery,' said Senior Inspector Edwina Lau, of the Hong Kong police Narcotics Bureau, who persuaded Chun after his arrest to make a full confession.
'It is an incredible story.' Chun, a Chinese national with two forged Thailand travel documents, followed a predictable travelling pattern in his drugs business: China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Burma and then, after collecting his narcotics booty, back to China to the provinces of Yunnan, Guangxi and Guangdong.
His main dumping spots in Guangdong, he told police, were Guangzhou, Baoon, Shenzhen and Dongguan, changing locations for safety and convenience. After plundering the Golden Triangle, it was always a simple case of a quick sortie to Hong Kong for his reward.