IT was just another day in Chinatown, New York City. More than 100 mourners gathered at the Hong Kong Funeral Home on Canal Street and watched a traditional Buddhist service, where the priest gave offerings of incense and food to keep the deceased well-fedin the afterlife.
What those gathered knew was that the dead young men, four of them, had been kept pretty well-fed in this life.
They were all members of the Fuk Ching gang, a triad society that for four years had terrorised the local neighbourhood and kept illegal immigrants in bondage to satisfy their thirst for ill-gotten riches.
It was the biggest gang funeral of the year in an area where triad killings are commonplace. Undercover police looked on as many of the male mourners, dressed in almost cliched matching gangland suits, black ties and sunglasses, bade farewell to the fourmen.
''Four funerals at the same time. It's very sad,'' said funeral director Ray Tong.
But from that June summer's day, it would not be long before more funeral arrangements had to be made. One week ago, on August 28, it was another Fuk Ching member, known as Ai Cheung, who was being buried in a Brooklyn cemetery when FBI and police officers swooped on the gathering and took away some of the mourners.
At the same time, at one of the gang's hideouts on the third floor of the Fukienese American Association at 125 East Broadway, and at a newly opened illegal gambling den on Eldridge Street, more raids were taking place.