One morning in Los Angeles County, a white range rover was cruising around, about to make several stops at local banks.

The vehicle was being tracked by law enforcement agents.

They set out to find the white range rover, which they see from the GPS trackers

parked at this bank branch in Artisia, in the city of Artisia.

That's our colleague Dylan Tokar.

Shortly after they get there, they see a man named Jiyaang Yu get out of the vehicle.

He's carrying a black backpack.

And his first stop is at the ATM machine outside the bank.

They can't really tell, but it seems like he deposits maybe a check there.

He then walks into the bank and one of the task force officers is following behind,

trying to look discreet. The agents were following the driver force officers is following, you know, behind, trying to look discreet.

The agents were following the driver, Jiang Yu, because they suspected he might be laundering money.

They see Yu approach a teller, and he just starts taking stacks of cash found with rubber bands out of his backpack and putting it on the counter.

Then Yu left, but the agent stayed behind.

They asked the bank teller if you deposited more than $10,000.

Anything above that amount is supposed to get flagged by the bank.

And she looks at them and she says, more like $100,000.

By then, Yu was already on his way to another bank.

Investigators allege that Yu is part of a new wave of sophisticated money launders,

all with ties to China, who are laundering money for powerful Mexican drug cartels,

and operating at such a scale and efficiency that it blows traditional money launders out of the water.

Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power.

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