Retired state parole officer and Chinatown activist Ken Hong Wong charged with bribery by USDOJ

(SAN FRANCISCO) Ken Hong Wong, a Chinese American retired state parole officer and Chinatown community activist, faces charges of bribery by the U.S. Department of Justice and becomes the latest defendant in San Francisco’s ongoing public corruption scandal.

Wong, 58, was also very close with Late San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee before Lee died in December 2017.

Wong retired from the State Parole Office in 2015. He’s now accused of bribing former Public Works director Mohammed Nuru with four separate $5,000 payments between December 31, 2018 and December 30, 2019.

According to the information filed by the U.S. Attorney's Office on June 5, Wong is charged with two counts of federal crime, including conspiracy to commit bribery and bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds.

"Specifically, on four occasions between December 2018 and July 2019, defendant Wong paid Nuru a total of $20,000 cash, made in individual payments of $5,000 each. Defendant Wong gave this cash to Nuru as a bribe in exchange for Nuru’s past and future official actions benefitting Wong, including to induce Nuru to hire Individual #1 for an engineering position at the Department of Public Works. Wong provided the cash to Nuru corruptly, knowing and intending it to be an illegal gift to him in return for his official actions on Wong’s behalf," U.S. Department of Justice stated in the information.

Wong could face as much as 15 years in prison and $500,000 in fines if he is convicted.

Nuru was the first among a list of over a dozen San Francisco city officials and contractors to be criminally charged by the Federal Investigation Bureau (FBI) on the public corruption investigation. Nuru was arrested by the FBI in January 2020.

Nuru was sentenced to seven years and is currently serving in federal prison. A number of Chinese American contractors were involved and charged by the federal authorities related to Nuru, including Walter Wong and Florence Kong, both former leaders at the Chinese Chamber of Commerce.

Ken Wong became more active in the Chinese community after he retired from the State agency.

According to NBC Bay Area News' report, Steve Gruel, Ken Wong’s attorney, said his client was simply a “go-between” in this case. He said Ken Wong had known Nuru for years because he ran a work program to assimilate parolees into the community and help clean up the Tenderloin and Chinatown areas.

Ken Wong was approached by an unnamed intermediary who was apparently working on behalf of a woman seeking a public works engineering job, Gruel told the NBC Bay Area News.

Ken Wong was arraigned on June 6 and entered a not-guilty plea to the charges. He was ordered released on $20,000 bond.

Before and after Ken Wong retired from the State Parole office, he was known to the Chinese community. He had actively participated in community events including the annual Chinese New Year Public Safety campaign news conferences at the Chinatown Gate on Bush Street. Ken Wong is fluent in English and Chinese.

Community members who have known him for years said that he was even more active in the community after retiring from the State Parole Office. He founded the China-USA International Trading Association in 2017 and Late Mayor Edwin Lee attended the ceremony.

Ken Wong had invited Lee to join the delegation to visit China before Lee passed away in December 2017.

According to the news reports in the Chinese language press, Ken Wong was among a group of friends to have dinner with Lee and his wife Anita Lee on the night before he died. It was the dinner for them to get together to talk about their future trip visiting China during the Christmas holidays in 2017.