Hey y'all, it's Mandy. Here on Cup of Justice, we dig deep into stories that challenge how we think about our legal system.

Criminal cases that ask questions about fairness, power, and accountability. And we are excited to share with you another podcast that does just that.

It's called the Chinatown Sting. And it looks at how the law has been used as a tool to make America both more and less just, all through the lens of a massive undercover drug bust.

In the late 80s, federal authorities received a tip that billions of dollars worth of heroin were being mailed to New York City inside boxes filled with tea.

The investigation would uncover a network

of drug smugglers who used women recruited at Mahjong parlors in Manhattan's Chinatown, women like

Tina Wong. Tina was a young mother who was asked to accept some packages in the mail. She

would be paid for it. When the feds were tipped off to her involvement, Tina had two choices,

spend years in prison or risk her life to help the government bring down the man at the helm,

one of New York's most notorious gangsters, Johnny Ang, aka Machine Gun Johnny.

On the Chinatown Steen host Lydia Jean Cutt and co-reporter Shu Yu Wang, interview witnesses, defendants, and federal prosecutors who have never spoken on record before to reconstruct a years-long effort to bring down one of the most powerful gangs in Chinatown, no matter the cost.

Okay, here is a preview of the Chinatown Sting. I hope you enjoy it.

If you do, find the Chinatown Sting wherever you get your podcast.

And if you want to binge the entire season early and ad-free, join Pushkin Plus.

Subscribe on a Chinatown Sting show page on Apple Podcast or at pushkin.fm.

slash plus.

On February 9th, 1988, David Sheehan was working his usual shift.

He was a U.S. customs agent at JFK Airport.

His phone rang.

I was talking to a customs agent in California who says,

hey, we just got three shipments of heroin and three different bail parcels.

Do you guys want the case?

...