Queens Duo Accused Of Selling Phony Coronavirus Cure: Feds

COLLEGE POINT, QUEENS — Two College Point businessmen are accused of taking advantage of the coronavirus pandemic to peddle dangerous, pesticide-laden products that they claimed would sanitize the air and kill the virus, federal prosecutors announced Tuesday.

Prosecutors said that Po Shan Wong, 55, and Zhen Wu, 35, sold pesticide-soaked cards that they falsely claimed could "replace masks" in curbing the spread of the virus, according to a criminal complaint.

The duo sold the products online, by phone and through Facebook from a business on 22nd Avenue in College Point, using images that show people wearing the credit-card-sized product on a lanyard, on the lapel of a man's suit jacket and on a child's stroller, prosecutors said.

The Facebook posts, which were referenced in court records, claimed the cards emitted chlorine dioxide and sanitized the air around the person wearing it.

Chlorine dioxide is a bleaching agent and pesticide known to cause difficulty breathing and tissue and organ damage. There is no evidence it has an effect on the COVID-19 virus.

“The brazenly false claims allegedly promoted by the defendants about their product potentially endangered the public not only by claiming to protect against the Covid-19 virus, but also by exposing users to the health hazard posed by a misbranded pesticide,” Acting U.S. Attorney Seth DuCharme said in a statement. “The Department of Justice is working closely with its law enforcement partners to protect the public from those who exploit the global pandemic to enrich themselves.”

Wong and Wu face charges of conspiring to distribute and sell one or more pesticides that are not registered with the United States Environmental Protection agency and that are adulterated or misbranded.

If convicted, they could each face up to one year in prison.