Scam King Extradited to China

Cambodia has extradited Chen Zhi, the alleged mastermind behind a multi-billion dollar illegal online gambling and pig butchering scam empire, and he may now face charges in his native China.

The 38-year-old head of the Prince Holding Group is famous in Cambodia for massive construction projects and a business empire that includes a commercial bank, philanthropic efforts and access to royalty and state officials which made him a regular on the society pages. Zhi also forged powerful connections with Cambodia’s government.

Behind the scenes, both the US and Chinese regulators allege he was the kingpin in an industrial-scale cyber fraud operation that sold romance scams and fake land investments from secure compounds. People trafficking, kidnapping and worse are just a few of the crimes he’s suspected of committing along the way, with workers forced to remain in the compounds, bound by debt slavery, and run long cons on unsuspecting Europeans and Americans.

American Charges Brought the House Down

The US issued public charges against Zhi in October 2025 and froze more than $15 billion in cryptocurrency in a single hit. Once the US sanctions took hold, Cambodia’s central bank ordered the liquidation of Prince Bank, Zhi’s Cambodian citizenship was revoked, and assets around the world, including a $130 million London office block, were seized or frozen.

Zhi was arrested in Cambodia and this month was extradited to China, where he is expected to face a laundry list of charges. The US authorities want Zhi, too, for wire fraud and money laundering charges, but the US regulators might have to wait a while.

As well as the litany of financial crimes, the Treasury Department of Cambodia recently said in a report: “Numerous reports have surfaced online of people enduring horrific treatment at sites associated with Prince Group TCO.”

That report focused on the trafficking and mistreatment of foreign workers in compounds much like the Prince Group’s set-ups across Cambodia. It detailed how workers are lured with the promise of legitimate jobs before being forced into online scams, having their passports confiscated, and being faced with physical abuse, confiscation of their travel documents and threats, and actual violence.

China has declared war on the Southeast Asian scam operations that target Chinese citizens, and has handed down death sentences for smaller crimes than Zhi stands accused of. Zhi has become the poster child of an industry that China is determined to stamp out, and he is now at the mercy of its notoriously tough legal system.